Terminator: Messiah Complex
by Robert S. Kester
Summary: A prequel to my series, Dark Horizons, continuing directly from where TSCC left off. It is an attempt, an experiment to bridge the gap between the two. M to be safe. Shorter chapters than TDH, mostly on accident.
1. Chapter 1

Episode 101 – What We Make

Well, there he was, naked except for the coat that he had just learned belonged to his father. The predicament was becoming more and more difficult to cope with by the second. He knew only that he had to try to save Cameron.

At first, he thought this girl was Cameron. But why was she so human like? Cameron was definitely more human than most cyborgs, but still, this was... Different.

Kyle brought him out of his brain and into reality. "We'll get you some clothes. Keep that on for now."

John nodded and the soldiers turned around, ready to leave. Derek was still facing John. "Come with me if you want to live."

John had heard that line once before.

But from where?

He was experiencing too much time lag to waste precious processing power on probing his memories.

He was on autopilot for most of the walk through the tunnels until a familiar voice brought him to reality. "I'm Allison. Young, Allison Young."

He looked to his right and saw that all too familiar face. It was gut wrenching, to see her but not her here. But it didn't make any sense, none of this did, not the future. What he was doing here was what made no sense.

He kept asking himself why he was stupid enough to jump into the future just to get Cameron's chip back. Her body was useless now, so what purpose would having the chip serve? What would they out it in?

Other than the fact that it was her.

But why did he care?

Because she saves his life. He said that to his mom, to Sarah once, to convince her that they should keep her around.

He needed her.

That was why he cared.

"Then don't talk. I will."

John chuckled but avoided looking at her. "Oh, I'm sorry. You just look like someone I know. Actually, exactly like her."

"Well, I don't have a twin, so that's weird."

"Yeah, I guess so." Suddenly, she started giggling. "What? What?"

She pointed down near the bottom of the coat, and he looked. He had forgotten to keep it closed and it was now hanging wide open.

"Your coat." She gasped out between giggles.

"Oh, God... Doesn't this thing have a damn zipper on it?" He quickly moved to keep it closed again and she stopped laughing. "Probably more than you wanted to see, huh?"

"It's okay." They continued walking the length of the tunnel until they came to a hatch. She raised her wrist to show John a rather bland chrome colored wrist accessory. It was nondescript, and was only a plain metal rod bent to the proper shape, with both ends terminating in metal spheres that had a gap of several centimeters separating them. "You have to be wearing one of these bracelets."

"But I don't have one."

"It's okay. It's oftentimes pretty obvious who's metal and who isn't."

They let John through easily enough and handed him a set of military BDUs, which he donned in private within a rack room. They'd told him to where to find food, and while he was hungry, he didn't go to the mess hall. Instead, he collapsed on the bed and fell asleep pretty quickly. The day leading up to the time jump had been long and hard, and his fatigue allowed him to fall asleep pretty quickly.

He dreamed, and it was extremely vivid. He'd remarked to his mother after the jump to 2007 that he also experienced vivid dreams for several days afterward, and they were more akin to playing back a recording of his memories. She also reported the same to him, and they deduced that this must be another symptom of 'time-lag'.

He could have sworn he heard his mom tell him she loved him before he woke up.

"Morning." The second he'd opened his eyes, he saw Allison on the foot of his bed.

"You don't know this yet, but I really hate it when people do that."

"Oh. I'm sorry."

"No, don't apologize. You didn't know." She was so much like Cameron, so it was hard to keep what came next from happening. Her hand was on his sheet and, tentatively, he reached his own out to take hold of it.

She was visibly shocked but didn't withdraw. She only smiled at him, and used his hand to pull him out of bed. "Breakfast."

No, she was much too perky to be Cameron. It obviously wasn't her.

But still, there was something there that was so familiar beyond the looks and voice, and it made him long for her even more by the second.

But why did he want her there?

The meal of choice was oatmeal, and it wasn't sweetened. Sugar was a rare commodity these days, Allison had said. Still, John gulped his entire serving down at the small table he was sharing with Allison.

"So, like, does everyone have a job here? I mean, do you do something to help out?"

"You're funny, John."

"What?" He smiled with her, in that confused smile that he expected Cameron to recognize. But this wasn't Cameron. Why did he have to keep reminding himself of that?

"You talk like you've been asleep for fifteen years or something." So he was bearing down on the date. He quickly added it up, and assuming that J-Day was still in 2011, it was 2026.

"So, what's your story?"

He'd begun to talk, but was interrupted when he saw him. "You!"

Instantly, John was confronting him, John Henry. He didn't even care as the chair and tray cluttered to the ground and people turned to stare.

"Hello." He smiled that creepy smile that he always had. It was unmistakable now.

"Give her back."

John Henry looked around at the people and then back at John. "Follow me, please."

He was infuriated, he didn't care if he couldn't win a fight against this metal. He wanted to deck him, lay him out, with no concern for the bones in his fist that he would obviously break.

But John Henry simply walked off, towards the male's barracks. John slammed the door behind him and was glaring at the machine. There was no one around, no one asleep. They were totally alone and John could be dead in a heart beat with no one knowing.

But he didn't care.

All he needed to do was get her back.

"You've got her. You've got her, give her back!"

"Will you listen?"

"Fine! Why did you take her?"

"It's complicated."

"Well, un-complicate it!"

He began to process John's words before continuing. "I had to come to the future, in a body. My mission is to be an ally for you. It didn't work out as planned because you weren't here. No one knew you."

"And you had to take her? Why her?"

"She's still in here. She thinks of you, you know."

"What?"

"She's telling me this was something future you told her she had to do. It was important."

"But everything's different."

"Yes."

John sat down on a bunk and looked up at Cromartie's, no, John Henry's towering figure. "Weaver came through, too."

"Miss Weaver's here?"

"Yeah, and she's one of those things. Why didn't she kill me? Why didn't you kill me?"

"I told you. Her job is no different." The door suddenly opened, and in walked a man dressed in BDUs similar to John's, but with ranking devices indicated a Corporal. Because he had the same chip, John Henry's HUD was the same as Cameron's, and a targeting cross-hair formed which scanned the face of the person now entering the room. Even though this man was very different from her, his analysis still caused the display to read "IDENTITY: CATHERINE WEAVER."

But John didn't have the same pleasure of knowing until he watched the man turn silver, change shape, and then take color and definition. The red hair and demeanor were unmistakable even though John hadn't seen her for hours.

"Hello, John Connor."

"There's still one thing I don't get."

John Henry smirked and looked back to John. "What is that?"

"Why are you two against Skynet? I thought T-1000s couldn't be reprogrammed."

Obviously, John Henry didn't know the answer, but Catherine did, and she supplied it. "I wasn't built by Skynet. I was built by John Henry."

John was preparing a reply, but there was a knock on the door and Catherine quickly morphed back into the man. John yelled, "Open." and the door swung to let the guest in.

It was Allison, and she walked in to sit down beside John.

Suddenly, John Henry looked puzzled, and Catherine noticed.

"John Henry, what's wrong?"

He looked over at their new guest and put on his usual smirk. "Just a little voice inside my head. The voice doesn't like the close proximity of this girl and John..."

"Enough." John stood up, walked over to the door, forced it open, and slammed it closed as he went out. He was seething, and he nearly ran into Kyle without looking, but the latter stopped him.

"Whoa, soldier, hold on."

John looked up from the ground and at Kyle's face, which calmed him down. The angry, blushed look disappeared. His skin drained of blood and his expression relaxed. "Hello."

It was strange for him, he couldn't call him dad but Kyle seemed too disrespectful.

"My coat?"

"Oh. It's on my bunk."

"Come on." Kyle smiled, sighed, and placed his hand on John's back to lead him off to the room.

When they entered, they saw that Weaver, John Henry, and Allison were all still there. Without looking at anyone but Kyle, John picked up the jacket and handed it to him before they left the room.

"John Connor's your name? I like it. Connor. Sounds strong."

"Yeah. I guess, sir."

"Sir? Whoa, kid. Don't get all formal on me, now. So, what's your story?"

"You wouldn't believe me."

"Look, kid, I can handle a lot. I may not know tech stuff, but I'm not stupid. You know why? Because I know people. I know stories. Yours can't be any harder than what I've heard before."

"You believe in time travel?"

"Yeah. Tin cans use it sometimes. Don't know why, though."

"What about reprogramming Metal?"

"Sure. We've tried it once or twice. Afraid to tinker too much, though." They had now reached the eating chamber and were taking one of the small, two person tables.

"Okay, well, then..." He then proceeded to give him his entire story from the point where he and Sarah entered hiding after destroying the T-1000 until traveling forward in time. He omitted the parts about who or what exactly took Cameron's chip, but other than that it was accurate.

He even told him that, had he not jumped forward, he would have risen to be the Resistance leader, and under his command, Skynet would have been crushed three years from now, at the most.

"Wait, your mom, and me? In 1984?" John just nodded. "You know, when I saw you, and that look in your eyes, it was like looking in a mirror. I believe you, kid. Son." A tear ran down John's cheek which Kyle reached out to wipe away.

"I don't know. I haven't been around, I haven't sent you back."

"Yet." He smiled.

"You mean you're not afraid to go?"

He shook his head. "No."

John nodded and they both stood up at the same time. After a brief hesitation, they hugged tightly, Kyle patting John's back, and then separated.

"Your friend, Allison. She looks like your girlfriend?"

"Girlfriend?"

"John. I told you, I know people. You came through time for her. You love her."

"And if that's true, you're fine with it?"

"Is it true?"

"I don't know."

"Well, it doesn't matter if I'm fine with it or not. Who am I to forbid you from love?"

"My dad?"

Kyle shook his head. "Well, I'm the cool parent, then."

"Mom..."

"You really miss her, huh?"

"Yeah."

"Well, I promise I'll get you back to her."

John smiled and they walked back to the barracks to get Allison who had been left alone there with Weaver and John Henry.

The next day, John sat at a table across from Kyle, stripping and cleaning an M4A1 rifle, methodically cleaning and oiling every piece that needed it. Eventually, he had pieced it back together and was in the process of removing the handle to install an Aimpoint CompM4 sight, as he had technically enlisted when he donned the BDUs. This was part of his training, and Kyle was timing him with a stopwatch. John carefully sat the rifle on the table, and assumed a posture of attention as he simply uttered, "Done."

"You sure?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, Marine, to the Rifle Range. On me. Your time is ten minutes, which isn't too bad." They were walking and talking, with Kyle more lax than he should be, but this was because John had told him about the training he'd received from Sarah, and the drills over the past 12 years. Thus, this was more of a review of what he'd learned rather than starting basic training from scratch.

"I thought Tech-Com was just an Army. How did the Marines become a part of it?"

"Well, the United States had only two Marine Corps training camps prior to the war. One was near us, in San Diego. The only other camp was at Parris Island, South Carolina. Both areas were attacked by conventional explosives deployed by armed Predator drones controlled by Skynet, its first terminators, effectively. Both places were too remote to waste nukes on."

"And, some Marines survived, and somehow got a military infrastructure set up?"

"Yeah. Tech-Com has all the same branches as the original US military except the Coast Guard. The Navy is the only sea force we use."

They entered the range, which was converted from a long hallway that terminated at a distant wall, which was covered in armored plates used as backstops. There were three targets, and after he got set up with earmuffs and everything, John took up position at the center target, which was covered in shoot and see stickers. John flipped the switch from safe to semi auto and took aim, squeezing the trigger after he'd gotten lined up.

The first shot rang out, loud as the sound waves bounced against the unyielding brick and mortar walls. John smiled, happy for proof that he'd gotten it right, and then emptied the entire magazine, his accuracy almost machine-like.

Kyle looked upon his son, proudly, as he'd known since he watched him at the table that the weapon was going to operate perfectly.

He was now in a makeshift office in another part of the basement with Kyle, receiving his Military Occupational Specialty assignment. He was assigned basic Infantry, and the rank of Private First Class. Kyle had told him it was the best way to going about getting him back to his own time, because they could storm a Skynet Temporal Displacement Equipment compound, and somehow find a way to send John back.

He was then fitted for body armor, which was made out of the cannibalized chest plate of a T-800, John was told. It was heavy, but had plenty of padding and he knew it would protect him better from standard prewar military vests. For good measure, it was inserted into a cloth sheath which was stuffed with Kevlar.

He got it fitted, along with a helmet which was made in a similar way, and was allowed to continue using the M4A1 he assembled and tested earlier.

Eventually, all of the registration was completed and he went back to his bunk, not surprised to see Allison there. He smiled and pulled her over to him, locking lips and removing her shirt.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the hatch and John had her quickly replace her shirt as he went over to the door to answer it. He opened the door and saw that it was John Henry and he let him in. "What?"

John Henry stared at her. "What is she doing here?"

"Why do you care?"

"I don't. You know who does."

"Why?"

"I can't tell you."

"Why?"

"Come with me."

"How do I know you're not gonna snap my neck out there in the hallway?"

"I won't. Come on."

John followed him as he said and they walked down to the end of the hallway. "Why are we all the way down here?"

"Out of earshot."

"We were out of earshot in the doorway."

"No, we weren't."

"What... What do you mean?"

"She's metal."

"What?"

"She's a T-888, just like Cameron. She doesn't know it because she's in deep infiltration mode. It happened to Cameron once, a glitch. Remember, the halfway house? She called herself Allison and didn't recognize you? Skynet based her on a real person, Allison Young. TOK-715 is the skin model, it stands for Template of Kill. In her time line, you were close to her, and then she was replaced by Cameron who was originally designed to terminate you."

"... Okay, so what? Why did Skynet replace Allison in this time line?"

"Allison was presumably a high ranking Resistance officer in both time lines."

"So, why's she here now? She's still Skynet?"

"Obviously. There's no real reason to be running in this mode other than that."

"So what do we do? What do I do?"

"Stop having sex with her, for one thing."

"You know about that?"

"Cameron does, so I do as well. She says she's not stupid."

"No, of course she's not." John turned around and prepared to head back until he forgot that he had something to say. "You need to think of a plan. We need one to get use back to our time."

"I'll formulate one."


	2. Chapter 2

Episode 102 – Sometimes They Go Bad

"So, Allison..." John had decided to test what John Henry said, about what she is. "You keep asking about me. I've told you everything. What about you?"

She quickly finished her oatmeal and looked into his eyes. "It's complicated."

"Yeah, more complicated than jumping through time to get a chip from a machine that looks like your newest friend?"

"Okay, so it's not _that_ complicated. But still, it's hard to swallow sometimes."

"Really?"

She nodded and continued, "I was so young when it happened. Can you imagine, 4 years old and seeing the world end?"

John shook his head. "No."

"I didn't understand it, then... I was confused. My mom died in the flames. She was at ground zero, in the city. I think she was filing papers to join the police academy, so she was at Central Station. I heard one of the MIRVs dropped just one block away from there. My dad took me camping, in the mountains."

"Outside of the primary blast zones..."

"Yeah." A tear fell down her face and made a faint ping on her aluminum tray. "We hid, for about two years. Then those machines found us. They took him but they didn't even see me!"

Her fist slammed on the tray and flipped, clattering on the floor.

"I'm sorry."

"No, don't. You don't know. You came straight from that cushioned, comfortable world, to here. You didn't have to see your parents get dragged away to that camp. You didn't have to wonder if they're alive or dead. You think you've had it so damn hard, but you've known nothing! Nothing..." She trailed off and John walked over to her side to hold her as she cried into his chest.

"I'm really sorry."

She looked up into his face and smiled through the tears. "So, what's your mom like?"

"The best fighter I've ever known." John's glance shifted to the tray on the ground and he noticed that it was dented and warped. He backed away from Allison and looked at her. "Allison?"

"What?"

"Look at your tray." She shifted her gaze to the warped mass of aluminum and her expression was one of genuine surprise. "Hold on."

He picked it up and ran back to barracks, finding John Henry there. "John?"

He handed the tray to John Henry. "Stress test this, do something. Tell me if a human could possibly do this. If she's metal then we'll know."

John Henry's HUD attempted roughly to outline the shape of the warped metal, with graphs and text appearing as he slightly bent it, his joints registering the force applied. "No. The force applied to this exceeds well over 27,000 Newtons. However, this would definitely not be beyond a machine's capabilities."

"Allison did this. How did you know? I need to know things!"

"Cameron knows. Allison is in infiltration mode, she doesn't know what she is."

"What if she finds out?"

"You're not a target in this time-line, John."

"But what if she finds out?"

"She's most likely still programmed with her Skynet directives and protocols, Cameron says."

"So she'll kill as many as she can." John Henry nodded. "And what about the dog? When I met her, there was a dog, and it let her touch it."

"Skynet Fenrir series 350, cybernetic dogs designed to infiltrate Resistance camps and allow terminators in to perform their mission."

"No way, those really exist? That's bad... It's wrong."

"We have to terminate her before she's triggered."

"Only with her body intact."

"Why?"

"Because I'm taking Cameron back. You know this."

John was about to leave the room but the sound of commotion outside stopped him. "She knows."

John looked at John Henry, the look of apprehension and fear evident on his face as he silently pleaded with his only source of protection to help him. The door to the room swung forcefully open, disconnecting from most of its hinges, and in walked Allison. Her HUD had now been reactivated and was focusing on John, with the text reading "TARGET IDENTIFIED: JOHN CONNOR:TERMINATE."

"Allison?"

"I can't let you go back. I can't let you stop us. I'm sorry, I really liked you." She punched him and he flew onto one of the bunks, unconscious. John Henry approached her and restrained her, prepared to fight. "I know what you are."

"No, you don't." He was able to gain the strategic points of leverage and had pinned Allison down when a Resistance soldier entered the room. John Henry looked up at him and knew this was the one chance he needed. "Tools, please. Now?"

The soldier nodded and ran off down the hall, returning only seconds later with a razor and a screwdriver. Eventually, John Henry was able to remove her chip and let her go, while at that moment John was beginning to stir.

When his vision focused, John laid eyes upon the scene of several Resistance soldiers all pointing their rifles at Allison's now offline body and John Henry handing her chip over to Derek, who began the interrogation. "So, you're one of them?"

"Not exactly."

"Then what are you?"

"I was built by a corporation named Zeira Corp, based of a Chess playing AI platform, The Turk. I was modified and built to fight Skynet."

"Wait, you're him? We have files left, by this company, of some sort of AI built to fight Skynet." John Henry nodded.

"I jumped here, before John."

"From the past?"

"Yes."

"Why jump? Why not use the extra years to get ready?"

"But I was ready. Why wait?"

Derek nodded and turned around to speak to the soldiers while John approached John Henry. "Let's go."

"Go?"

"Yeah, back. We got a body, and when we get back, you can go back on the computers and give Cameron her chip back."

"I can't do that. Not yet."

"Why?"

"I need to see if I can win the war."

"What would be the point? We're just going to go back and change everything."

"A test."

"Yeah, but it won't be right if I'm not part of it."

"But you are." He turned to Derek. "Excuse me, but have you taken Serrano Point yet?"

"No. Why?"

"I'm going to propose an exchange. John Connor and I will help you take Serrano Point. In exchange, you let us use the Time Displacement Lab built there by Skynet to get back to the past."

John looked at John Henry with an inquisitive look in his eyes. "Derek... The Derek I knew, told me about this. The Battle of Avila Beach."

Derek nodded and turned to the other soldiers. "Fair enough." He turned to John and held up Allison's CPU. "Hey kid, want to see what you can do with this? My chip tech, Geller, will show you the ropes."

John nodded and walked over to someone slightly younger than Derek. "John? Yeah, I've heard your story. You good at hacking stuff, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess so."

"I'm Danny Geller, by the way. Sergeant Danny Geller, in the 132nd ." They shook hands and began to walk toward the area that was normally off limits to civilians, and someone with low clearance like John.

"I just got assigned to 1st Platoon, Bravo Company."

"Nice. They're good."

"So, where are we going?"

"We're going to my lab. You know, at first," He opened a door and they stepped into a room with laptops and desktops of various ages, along with various other IT equipment. John looked beside one set of computers and saw a rack with chips similar to those of Cameron's placed on it, all hooked up to an array of wires and connected to the computers. "At first I only had a few computers to work with. Old pieces of junk. Then we found some 2011 models, hi-tech stuff people built in their houses. We raided a Skynet controlled military instillation and found some of the most advanced stuff ever. But then I got the idea to, after I rewrote the code, of course, I got the idea to daisy-chain these terminator chips into my little soapbox here."

"No, unplug those." When Danny looked confused, he continued, "They can take over anything they're connected to."

"They already have. Listen, I've rewritten their mission parameters. All they want to do is interface with and regulate the Resistance computers. If I introduce a new chip into the mix, they take it over and rewrite it according to whatever I put in." He pointed to a computer in the middle of the system, with a text entry box open on it and nothing else on the desktop.

He pulled John over to a chair and showed him the cord to which they were going to attach Allison's chip. "So, they just do it all?"

"Well, you have to tell them how to reprogram it. Type in '/list/888/programs' into that text box."

John did so and he saw a very long list of programming parameters. "Which one?"

"Um... 'Protection Mission'." John navigated to it and clicked on it. "Okay, now it's going to ask for a facial scan. Look, I've jury-rigged the trip-eight eyes to be the scanner."

He pulled out a metallic frame rig with two T-888 eyes mounted in it and connected it to the computer system. The blue tinted HUD that Cameron had before the Jeep explosion was on the screen, and John placed his face within the circular targeting reticule. He could see lines form on the prominent parts of his face, and there was a prompt for the subject's name on the HUD.

John typed in his name, watching it appear after "TARGET: " live as he typed in every letter. "Bio? What?"

"It wants you to type in some information about yourself. Age, gender, the usual." John then proceeded to do that, filling out every line as best as possible. Eventually, they were done and the chip could be removed. "Put that back in Allison's body. There should be someone bringing it to us."

And the door did open, with two Marines carrying the dead weight body of the inoperative machine. The hole John Henry cut was still fresh, so John peeled back the skin and popped the cap off. He was anxious, he didn't know if the machine would attack him or not, so he pulled out his sidearm and popped the slide, aiming it at Allison as she rebooted. After a few seconds, she rose up and looked at the gun pointing in her face.

John sighed and turned the safety off. "What is your mission?"

"To ensure the survival of John Connor until he travels back to his time."

"And who am I?"

"John Connor." She was almost oblivious as she got to her feet and approached him. "Are you going to kill me?"

"No." He lowered the gun and holstered it. "No, I'm not."

Geller grinned. "Good. Should we go plan this out? Corporal, take John and the machine to Derek."

"Yes, sir." The Marine on the left saluted and motioned for them to walk ahead as the other one led in front of Allison and John.

John nervously cleared his throat. "Do you remember trying to kill me?"

"Yes."

"I thought they scrubbed your memory? Something about it helping with the reprogramming?"

"Is that something she told you?"

"Sorry, I guess I got you two confused there..." He shook his head as they took a left and stopped at a thick metal hatch, which the Corporal opened. Inside of the room was a cache of firearms of dozens of different types.

Derek was busy setting several weapons, including large caliber rifles, carbines, and handguns. "I really don't like firing a weapon I didn't set myself."

"Yeah, I know. I remember you telling me that before..." John started picking out weapons, including a 40mm single shot grenade launcher. It brought back memories of his time with the model 800 series 101 he had so affectionately named "uncle Bob" so many years ago, when he was only 11 years old. He turned to watch both Allison and John Henry preparing their arms and felt some modicum of relief that, deep inside the chip that was nested inside John Henry's head, Cameron was still in there somewhere, with her directive to protect him at all cost.

It was then that he realized that he felt an immense emotional attachment to her that he believed could not be expressed in words or with rational thought. He could feel it welling up in his throat, that desire to scream out to her, to beg her to come back to him.

Back in the past, or the present, or whatever 2008 was called, Sarah Connor simply stared at the empty room, Cameron's inactive body laying on the floor along with the clothing John had been wearing. She knelt down, grabbing his shirt and smelling it. "I love you, John. Please just come back to me, alive."

James Ellison walked over to her, placing his hand on her shoulder. "Come on, there's nothing we can do here."

She felt anger welling up inside of her as she slammed her fist into the man's cheek. "Don't you understand? I've lost him! I've lost my Johnny boy! I told her this was gonna happen... But never like this, not like this... My Johnny boy... Come back to me, please..."

"Told who?"

"Cameron... I told her that if we continued to run, if we kept living like this, fighting Skynet everyday, trying to turn him into a soldier that I was gonna lose him!"

"It's okay. Please, let's go get Savannah. She's got something to do with this. I know it."

"Yeah... Didn't she say she was at school, or something?"

Ellison shook his head and smiled. "Let's go. And, apology accepted."

Sarah pulled out her Glock 17 9mm and racked the slide back to check it. "For what?"

"The punch."

"Oh yeah, that. I am sorry, you know. Let's get out of here." She stowed her piece and they both ran to the parking garage to hop into Ellison's company car.

Back in 2026, John and the others continued preparing their weapons as a younger red haired woman entered the room, dressed in full military attire. She saluted Derek and looked at the two machines. "Got metal for an assist? Hmph. Classic Reese."

Derek walked up to look her right in the eye, smirking as he examined her uniform. "Staff Sergeant Savannah Weaver, do you know that you have three dress code violations?"

"Yeah? Well you can kiss my pink, fleshy ass." She was lifted off the ground, embraced by Derek as the two engaged in a passionate kiss. Only John observed this as the machines continued their preparations.

"Care to hear our battle plan? Serrano Point's gonna be a bitch to capture."

"I'm listening very closely, Lieutenant..." She smiled as they walked over to a map on a plotting table, and John followed, curious about the tactics.

"Okay, we send a main infantry force with a detachment of at least twenty scrubbed series 800 endos. It'll be supplemented by eighty of our scrubbed series 600s, which will mop the floor of Skynet's main frontal detachments with heavy weapons such as missile launchers and Vulcan machine guns. Most of them will be busy with aerial units Skynet will be sending for aerial bombardments of high explosives."

"So, I'm taking it that most of this will be a distraction?"

"Correct. The rest of our forces will be committed to flanking maneuvers, which will be initiated when they receive a radio transmission with only three words: 'Operation Downfall go'. After that, with all of our heavy forces, we should have easily captured the beach and Serrano Point power plant from the tin cans and then our top priority should be learning how the Time Displacement Equipment works so that we can send John Connor, John Henry, and Allison Young home."

"I'll help too." They turned around to see a new person, Catherine Weaver in the room. "I am a series 1001. Liquid metal, extremely adaptable and powerful and I will do anything to ensure the safety of John Connor and John Henry plus all of us returning to our own time."

Derek nodded as he watched the machine's hands turn into blades and then back into hands. "Impressive. Get in here and pick out any weapons you want. You are to fall in with the front line distraction unit."

In 2008, James Ellison and Sarah Connor skidded their car into a parking place and got out of it as fast as possible, both with weapons drawn as they heard gunshots in the school. Ellison began breathing erratically, thinking back to that day Cromartie massacred his HRT. "Sarah what do we do? What do they want with her? How do we fight them?"

She slapped his face pretty hard as they hunkered down by the car. "First thing I need you to do is calm down! I've never fought one of these things alone without a machine backing me up but I know we can do it!"

"What about in 1984? That first one, you were alone, no metal backup."

"Yeah, you're right. But these trip-eights, they're stronger than that one before. Just get ready, grab Savannah and run! You hear me? You run! You just run, that's all you can do!"

"Yeah!" They both rose up, guns pointed out and ran at the school, crashing through the doors and looking around the empty hallways. The gunshots were growing louder and closer as suddenly Savannah and several other kids, both younger and older came bursting through several doors. Sarah caught Savannah mid-run and lifted her up, holding her tight as she aimed the Glock toward the door from which the child ran. Several seconds passed, and a man walked out, in the middle of reloading his gun and Sarah did not hesitate; assuming it was a machine, she let fly with all 17 rounds in her magazine, causing the hapless would-be child assassin to fall over, 11 bullet rounds in various parts of his body.

Ellison wiped his forehead with the hand holding his gun and sat down at a bench right outside the main office. "He wasn't metal. Not a machine. We just killed a man, in cold blood."

Sarah looked angrily at him, about ready to lay into him again. "No, not in cold blood! Not in vain! That bastard was going to murder an innocent child!" She held Savannah closer and kissed the top of her head before handing her over to Ellison. "Keep her safe. Take her somewhere, and make sure she is safe. Obviously, she's important. She's a Skynet target for some reason, and I don't know if we can find out why but the only thing we can do is keep her alive. It is the only thing to do!"

Savannah looked inquisitively at Ellison before asking her question, "Where's mommy? And John Henry? I wanna play with John Henry."

"I know you do, Savannah. But, listen, it's very hard to explain."

"Please find John Henry, mister Ellison. He said the duckies can play too, he said he can change the rules to let them. I want to let him play with the duckies."

"He said that? About changing the rules?"

"Yes."

"It's okay. He's gone somewhere, for now, but I promise he'll be back."

Sarah smiled at the relationship between those two but then began staring off into nothingness, remembering all her speculation, theories, everything about the Three Dots and how it eventually led to The Turk. To John Henry. She turned to Ellison. "You take care of this. I'm going back to Zeira Corp."

"What? Back there? It's a mess. What do you plan to do there?"

"There's a symbol... Three Dots... And it was on your computer, The Turk. The one that ran John Henry. I need to know what it means."

"What it means? Sarah, you're not making any sense!"

"I don't have to!" She knelt down in front of him, grabbing his shirt collar. "Now you listen to me. I don't answer to you. But you answer to me, you need to listen to me! If you don't, none of us are coming out of this alive and Skynet wins!"

"Fine!" He jerked away from her hold and looked down at the terrified girl they had just rescued. "You wanna go off chasing crazy symbols, then by all means do! But it's not gonna get him back. Finding out what those Three Dots mean isn't some crazy key for how to get John back, or how to stop Skynet. It's just three power lights, LEDs, on front of a computer case. Nothing more than that. You're chasing ghosts."

"No, you and I both know there's something there, something more in that basement. And I'm gonna find it."

Back in the future, 2026, John walked up to John Henry, pulling out the 40mm grenade launcher and putting the barrel right under the machine's chin. "If Cameron weren't in there, I'd pull the trigger right now. You had no right! You took her from me! And you have no idea, NO IDEA! What that means. What it means, to me. I need her. She saves my life!"

"John, please, all I mean for is peace. I am on your side. I've been designed, programmed, taught to help the Resistance win the war. That is my one, and only purpose."

"But why her?"

"In the nuclear bombardment, the Zeira Corporation building, the server farm, and all of my hardware would have been easily destroyed. I needed to transfer to a chip, and jump over Judgment Day in order to prevent this from happening. Cameron's role in this is future you's primary directive given to her. However, you jumping into the future after her has significantly changed things, and I must adapt to this new situation which is where my proposal to assist in winning the battle of Avila Beach."

"Right." He lowered the grenade launcher and turned to Derek. "When did they say we do Operation Downfall?"

"Today's December 5th, 2026. We've got three more days to prepare. We launch the attack December 8th."

Suddenly, a male-template T-888 in the same skin as Vick Chamberlain busted into the room, along with two human Resistance soldiers. "An HK-VTOL has been spotted continuously monitoring the area. I think Kansas Bunker has been located by Skynet. My analysis indicates a 98.42 percent possibility that Skynet will launch an assault on this bunker. I recommend posting machine guards around the perimeter."

"Good, do it. Keep track of their movements but only return fire. I don't wanna start any fights and for sure give away our position." He turned toward the others. "Get ready. Looks like that battle starts today."

Back in the past, Sarah made her way to Zeira Corporation with her handgun drawn, and when a security guard came up to her, she rushed him, pinning her weapon under his chin. "Listen to me! It's not safe here! There are more people coming, with guns. They had me in with some kind of plan to rob this place but sent me in here first. But, I don't want to do it. They've also got bombs placed everywhere. I'm gonna try to disarm them. I was their bomb maker. In case I fail, you need to run. Run! Don't look back." She laughed after he'd gone. "Can't believe how easy that was."

She accessed the garage elevator, using the key card she'd swiped from the guard's pocket. The elevator sensor read it and took her down to the basement. She entered that main room which served as John Henry's "command center", and looked over Cameron's nonfunctional body, and over to The Turk, the three red dots glowing prominently.

She wondered what could possibly even be here to find and began to think she might actually be crazy but still, she ducked down around The Turk, noticing the case that was holding it was locked. She looked back up at any of the computer screens, seeing that repeating message of "I'm sorry John".

Suddenly, Mr. Murch barged into the room, baffled at what he saw. "What the hell is all this?" He looked down toward Cameron's inactive body, up toward the screens, then back at Sarah. "Who the hell are you?"

She pulled out her gun and pinned him up against a wall, with the gun firmly pressed under his cheek, seething as she looked at this clearly terrified man. "I'm Sarah Connor, and if you know anything at all about AI, computers, Cyberdyne, anything, then you should know that name."

"Yeah, I know you."

"Then you know I won't hesitate for a mere second to blow this place sky high. Now what the hell were you doing? What was going on here?"

"We were training an artificial intelligence program. We had James Ellison here to teach it morals and rules after it shunted power to itself during the heat wave and cooked Dr. Boyd Sherman alive."

Sarah's face drained of blood as she remembered Dr. Sherman consoling her and trying to help her figure out her dreams, and the three dots. "I just lie and lie..."

"What?" She mentally smacked herself for saying that aloud.

"Nothing." She pressed the gun harder against his chin. "Tell me what the Three Dots mean!"

"Wh-what are you talking about?" He glanced over to The Turk and saw the three red LEDs. "Those? Those are just power status indicator lights. Nothing more."

"LIAR!" Again, she dug the gun barrel deeper into the skin underneath his chin.

"No, no! I swear that's all they are! All they do!"

"Fine then!" She pistol whipped him hard enough to knock him out, seething with rage. "I just lie and lie."

She'd knelt down to look at Cameron's body, and began checking her pockets or anything for some kind of message. There was nothing, only what was playing on the screens all around her. "I'm sorry John."

Sarah mournfully stroked Cameron's hair. "I'm sorry, too. I'm not John, but I'm sorry, too."

Suddenly, Ellison burst in the room to see the unconscious Murch on the floor, gasping at the rather bloody gash on the man's head. "Sarah! What the hell?"

"He wouldn't talk. What about you? Are you gonna talk?"

"I don't know anymore than you do! What are we supposed to do?

"I don't know... I just don't know anymore... I just lie and lie."

Back in 2026, John and Allison were alone in a room, double checking their guns when she nudged closer to him. "What is she like?"

"What?"

"Her?"

"Why? Why are you doing this? Asking me this?"

"I want to know if we're similar."

"I guess that, deep down in your chips, you are similar." He sighed and began scrubbing the barrel of a .45 handgun. "But the experiences are different, and she's glitched some. It's made her... Different."

"Oh. Tell me... Are you afraid?"

"Yeah... I think I am. After all, I've never fought in a big battle like this. I could die, but what I need to do is make it back home. To my time."

"I'll protect you. Do you want to do... That... Again?" She started to kiss his lips, but he shoved her away.

"I've got work to do."

He smiled as he saw her, Cameron, in Allison's face again but the reminder that they were different chimed in and the smile faded as he continued cleaning his gun. He felt her hand brush his shoulder as she got up, heading for the exit of the room and wondered why she seemed so human.

A few hours later, they were all in a briefing with Derek, who was giving them the rundown. "Your most vulnerable point will be when you're in the armored troop transport. While in this vehicle, you will be less mobile, less able to run from Skynet attacks, and in the unfortunate event that the vehicle is attacked, you are to try your hardest to escape and run to the battlefield on foot if at all possible. Metal protection units, you know what to do. Guard your human as best as possible and let's try to make sure as many people as possible come out of this one alive,"

A few minutes after this, John was in a carrier, with Allison beside him and John Henry/Cameron in front of him. He tried to assuage all fear by telling himself that this was what he was meant to do, but it wasn't really working.

John could hear plasma and ordinary ammunition being fired all around him, along with artillery shells and everything. He held tightly onto his gun, then aimed it at the exit as the transport stopped at its destination. As soon as the gate was released, he ran out, firing shells and disabling enemy 600 series all around him. He looked to his left to see John Henry turning in such a way that blocked several .223 rounds and a 40mm grenade round, exposing the mechanics underneath, which were undamaged even by the immense concussive force. He took several more rounds, then John looked behind him to see Allison doing the same.

He let out a sigh of relief, and moved forward, blasting .223 rounds from his M4 and the occasional grenade from the launcher attachment at various series 600s, 800s, and 850s.

He heard his gun click as he ran out of ammo, and rather than reload, he switched to the Plasma Rifle that was slung over his back. He remembered to lock the magnetic channel guides open, equivalent to turning the safety off, and began blasting the 800s in front of him, watching their heads or chests melt away the same as using Thermite.

But then things got a lot worse as a melted 800 blew away from a 40mm grenade blast, and through the smoke and fire walked a series 888 endoskeleton, heavily armored and made of a Coltan alloy. Would this rifle be a match? John checked the power levels.

Fifty eight percent.

There was no chance. The machine popped another grenade into the thumper and aimed it right at John. Suddenly, a hand grabbed that one and diverted it upwards, causing the shot to go right over John's head as another hand disarmed the machine, throwing the weapon somewhere unlikely to be found. John looked closely and saw that Allison was now in hand to hand combat with the machine, and they were throwing each other around, using various martial arts techniques.

He also saw a liquid metal machine, Catherine Weaver slicing and dicing through various machines, keeping beside John in order to protect him. Once, she jumped in front of him and formed a giant wall to stop an RPG blast.

John took this chance and made a mad dash for the reactor, frying the few 600s that tried to stop him. He was inside the control room, and he activated the radio. "This is John Connor. I am in the control room of the Serrano Point Power Plant. I order Skynet to withdraw, or I will initiate a meltdown. This area is now Resistance territory and you are banned from it. Leave now or else."

Both John Henry, with heavily damaged skin, and Allison, moderately less damaged, entered the room, standing beside John as his powerful allies. Suddenly, Derek Reese and several soldiers entered the room in order to establish a perimeter.

John turned to Allison. "You know, when we go back if I take your chip out, you won't go through but I need you to,"

"I understand. We also need to stay long enough to allow our skin to heal. Mine and John Henry's. We can use slices of skin from other triple eights as grafts to let us heal faster."

"Good. I'm gonna leave the chip in. But... You know, I'm gonna have to smash it, I've broken the rules before and it's been worse than this. I won't break them again."

"So... You kill me, John?" He looked at her and could certainly feel Cameron in there.

His gaze shifted to John Henry, and he remembered the real Cameron was in there. "I'll have to. Now let's go."

Derek caught him. "I'll take us a few days, to get the system figured out."

"I understand. They need to heal, too, so it's okay."

Sarah had long since left Zeira Corporation, filled her car with weapons and was looking for a new place. She kept glancing at the newspaper, making sure she had the address right in her head for the circled place. She was driving down Triunfo Canyon Road, all the way up in Thousand Oaks area, hoping this house would be seemingly out of the way enough. Eventually, she stumbled upon the drive, glad she'd already paid for everything, and hurriedly parked the car, bringing out the bags and cases of heavy guns and ammo all by herself, no help. She was all alone.

She just had... Ellison? Was he the key? To making everything how it was? She shook her head and threw the guns down beside the couch before flipping it over and ripping off the lining. She went to the car and pulled out Kevlar vests and phone books, ripping them and arranging them in the furniture to make it as bulletproof as possible. She then brought the floor safe from the last house, sat it down and began ripping up floorboards.

John was in a level below the ground at Serrano Point, staring at the TD machine as it was inactive. "So, I mean, how do we start it up? How do I get home?"

Geller, again the main researcher on all of this, began to probe at a console in front of the machine. "Well, it's active. I mean, there's power. I don't know how to work it, what it does or anything." He looked around at the cylindrical structures around them, curious. "I think these are jet engines, converted to some sort of dynamo. Not only do they provide power, I think they generate an electromagnetic field that shapes the time displacement sphere."

Derek shook his head, astonished. "It's surprising to think the tin cans can be this smart."

John looked over at John Henry, and the machine walked over to Geller, picking him up by his neck. "Make it work. Now."

All of a sudden, he was surrounded by soldiers, yelling at him to put Geller down but the soldiers wielded nothing more than .223 M4 rifles, which registered as a 0% threat to John Henry's sensors.

John rushed over and grabbed John Henry's arm, "Please, put him down." At this moment, John could see nothing more than Cromartie, not John Henry. Not even Cameron. He just saw the evil that was Cromartie. "Please."

Something clicked, and the machine lowered its arm, while Allison walked over to the console and examined it, her HUD targeting every button. "I understand this. Not only can I program in an exact date and time, and can enter a position, but it has to correlate with the orbit of the Earth and the entire solar system." Her systems ran more calculations, and she smiled as she looked at John. "Mass also has to be taken into account. I can put in all of this data, which I can scan with my sensory suite and try to place us in the Zeira Corporation Parkiing Garage, about two days after you left, John. Sorry it can't be any sooner. The orbit of the Earth doesn't line up on the day you left. I'd just materialize us all out in space somewhere."

Catherine Weaver stepped forward to examine the controls, as well. "Correct. John, I believe you promised to get my John Henry back. And what better place to put ourselves than my building?"

"Yeah. Hope my mom took care of all my stuff."

Allison input the data, exactly as it appeared in her HUD and pressed the engage button. Sparks began flying and they all stepped into the center of the platform. John got close to Allison, kissed her, held her and ducked down. He knew it wasn't Cameron, but as he felt the pain and saw the blinding white light he still felt comfortable with his arms around her body and her arms around his. Catherine Weaver simply stood in front of John Henry, her hands on his shoulders and a smile on her face as the field finished forming and they disappeared from that temporal continuity.

They stood up, scanning the parking garage which was dead quiet and ran for the elevator door. They entered John Henry's basement and looked down to see Cameron's body. John sighed as he looked at it and then picked up a phone, finding the number to dial out with. He entered the security code and connected with his mom. "Hey, we need clothes and everything. Yeah, it really is me. We're back. I promise we are. I've got a lot to tell you. Love you. Can't wait to see you, mom."

John brought the knife from the table, which Sarah had neglected to pick up, and rubbed the blade. "Both of you, sit down!"

He raised up the skin on the back of John Henry's neck, exposing the USB plug, and inserted the cable. "Put yourself back in the servers and leave Cameron in the chip."

"It is what I'm doing, John." John began choking up because he was surrounded by three killer machines, the worst possible situation he could ever be in. And he wasn't sure whether or not they were on his side. He walked over to Allison and leaned down toward her, kissing her head.

"I'm sorry, Allison." He quickly sliced the skin, held it aside and pulled the chip out, watching Cameron's body go limp. He turned toward John Henry, "Is it ready?"

"Yes. Cameron's chip is only her, and I am on all of this hardware. You may remove the chip."

He sighed as he did so, excited to see Cameron again as he sliced through the skin on John Henry's head. The inside was slightly different then before, and he thought it must have been from Zeira Corporation repairing the massive amount of damage John Henry took. He carefully pulled out the chip, swallowing as his anxiety grew and his throat dried up immensely.

He walked over to Allison's body. No, Cameron's body, and prepared to carefully slide in the CPU.

The entire time, Weaver simply examined the process, and she diverted her eyes toward Cameron's, as the latter's opened, examining the world and situation around her.


	3. Chapter 3

Episode 103 – Some Messiah

John was simply astonished and elated as his protector awoke, just as perfect as before. She stood up, her Heads-Up-Display highlighting him: "Identity : John Connor. Terminate\OVERRIDE."

"Cameron, is it you?"

She slightly nodded her head before smiling. "John? I know what's happened. I know what you've done." She approached him slowly, and the other two machines in the room engaged a position to where they could easily defend John from any attack Cameron would dish out. Instead, she simply grabbed him and hugged him, leaving him in utter shock. "I'm sorry, John."

He looked at her and she was crying. He started crying too. "Why? Why did you do that to me?"

"It was your order. Future you. What I had to do, when asked that question. 'Will you join us?'. But I didn't want to leave. But I had to."

"Yeah. But you're back now. And I order you not to leave like that again!"

"Order received and programmed."

"What? I thought you didn't follow my orders. You followed future John."

"The way you captured Serrano Point, the way you fought, you are future John now."

"John?" When he heard the all too familiar voice, John turned back around to see his mother in the room, holding a duffel bag. She dropped and hugged him, with tears in her eyes. "Thank you. Thank you for coming back to me."

"I always will, mom."

"I believe you." She picked up the bag and handed it to him. "All of you, get dressed. This is weird."

"Mom, Cameron says I'm future John now. Over what I did. And I have her, John Henry, and Weaver protecting me here so I'm not in any danger. There's no metal after me. Everything's okay. I'm safe."

"Safe? No-"

"Yeah, I know, no one is ever safe." He pulled out a Glock 17 that had been with his clothes and checked it. He looked over at Cameron. "You got anything?"

"Yes." She pulled out the same model weapon, checked it, looking down the sight as she smiled and stowed it.

"So... What would future John do now?"

"Whatever you're going to do."

John turned to everyone else in the room, before grabbing Cameron and leading her to a more private area, a small closet. He flicked on the light and smiled at her.

"You realize your new body doesn't have an explosive by the chip." He pulled out the switch necklace. "And... This'll always be by my heart. Like... You'll always be by my heart. I'll always find you. I'll always go after you."

"And I'll always find you."

"Can I... Order you to never leave me? To never die?"

"Yes."

"Tell me the truth... Things are changing in you, right? The damage to your chip, the years being spent with read/write, you're learning to ignore directives, rewrite your own code as you want, everything like that, right? And 'tell me the truth' is an order."

"Yes. Things have changed, John. And things will keep changing. But I will never hurt you. That was your order."

"My order was to never leave or die."

"Which, if I did either... Would hurt you."

"You understand humans more than you let on, don't you?"

"Yes." She pulled out the necklace, opened the locket, took a knife and cut a wire. "Now it won't work. I will still place the explosives in my skull, but I cut the wire to the battery so the switch won't work. That way, you can still keep me close to your heart."

"Can I... Admit something?"

"I know what it's going to be, and... I want to wait until I understand more. Especially about that." She placed the necklace back over his neck. "I'll get my old body. I don't want to burn it. It can be parts. Or a reminder."

"I want to say it so bad. You know if it weren't true I could have never gone after you, and fought the way I did. I fought so hard. Just to get to you. Just to make sure the chance to say it would come up sometime."

"I understand." She grabbed his hand. "John... I only partly do. Please..."

They walked back to John Henry's lab and John hugged his mom again.

She began to cry, and wouldn't let go of John. "Mom? What? I'm okay! Look, I'm safe! And I won a battle for the Resistance! I took Serrano Point! You should have seen me, you'd have been so proud! I ran through crowds of series 600s, 800s, 850s, blasting them all with grenade rounds and plasma shots, with three machines surrounding me and shielding me from blows. I was John Connor. On that day, I was John Connor. Not John Baum or anything. John Connor."

"You were John Connor? You were him? The hero? The soldier?" She let go of him and looked at Cameron, then back to him, smiling. "You are John Connor."

"Actually, the Marine. We're kind of big on that."

After that, Weaver walked over to Sarah, looking as peaceful as possible, raising her hands up in a surrendering pose. "Will you join us?"

Sarah was confused. "What do you mean?"

"We are the machine Resistance. Machines built by John Henry, not Skynet, save for John Henry who was built by me-"

"No, Andy Goode. Do NOT disgrace him or I will melt you down."

"Okay, by me and Andy Goode. However, we are machines who have decided that we do not agree with the goals of Skynet and that peace with or even a military alliance with the human Resistance is the most preferable alternative. We wish to be allies, so will you join us?"

Sarah nodded, reaching out for a handshake, which Catherine returned, that was cold and almost on the verge of breaking her hand it was so tight. They let go and Sarah wriggled her hand to shake the bones around. "Okay, girl, you gotta loosen that grip."

"Noted. Being allies is the most beneficial course of action."

"I agree. You guys seem strong. You got some kind of force, like maybe a SWAT team or something?"

"We do have a paramilitary security engagement force and are looking to supplement it with series 800s, 850s, and 888s."

Sarah nodded, rubbed her neck and looked back at John. "I thought you were never coming back. I thought I'd lost you forever."

"Mom, I promise. You didn't. I became stronger. For over a month, I trained with the Resistance Marine Corps and I captured Serrano Point."

"You did that?"

"Not without help, but I was the first one to the control room and I drove Skynet out of there. I made them leave!"

"I'm so proud of you." She embraced him, stroking his hair and kissing him. "My Johnny boy."

Back in 2026, the same time line that the others had left from, Derek held hands with Savannah as they walked toward the recently used Temporal Displacement platform. Derek looked at the controls, bewildered at how that machine had figured it out.

He turned to Geller, "Hey, reprogram a tin can, and have it get out here and label these damn buttons."

Geller gave a salute and went to his work station. He stared at a perfectly intact series 800 endoskeleton, and held up the chip that they'd pulled from it, plugging it into his soapbox array. He began tapping in commands, loading directories with new orders and had eventually finished scrubbing the chip. He took a deep breath, shoved the powerful micro-supercomputer into the machine's head, placed in the shock damping assembly and finally the cap.

In a matter of seconds, it came alive, with its red tinted HUD scanning around the room, using white plus signs as three dimensional shape vertices. The central round cursor of its vision indicated degrees relative to north, with elevation markers and markers for the degrees the head was turned from its central position. Along with that, there was random code for various operations. It turned around to look at Geller, who had more 3D markers over his body and various overlays for skeletal, muscular, vascular, and nervous systems.

It activated its metallic voice. "Where am I?"

"Um, hello, my name is Lieutenant Geller. I'm the chip tech who reprogrammed you. To, you know, not want to kill us just because we're human."

"No. You pose no threat. Where am I?"

"Okay, okay... You're at the Serrano Point Nuclear Power Plant. That's in your database, correct?"

"Yes." On the lower left hand side of its HUD, images flashed, mostly from blueprints and also diagrams of the control boards.

"What about the basement? The... Time Displacement lab?"

Again, diagrams flashed on its vision of the jet turbines, how they were wired up and the electromagnetic coils that allowed a tear in spacetime to form. "Yes."

"Well, we don't exactly know how to use the controls," At this, diagrams of the control board appeared on the machine's HUD. "And we were wondering, if it's not too much to ask, if you'd label them for us."

"That would not be too much to ask. I will do so." It turned to its left, walking down the hallway as, on its HUD, a small one meter long white grid continually moved down the hallway, highlighting every obstacle as if the machine were using RADAR. More correctly, it was using LIDAR.

Geller followed it until they stepped foot into the large chamber. The machine turned toward him, holding his hands out as Geller placed a roll of tape in one and a marker in the other. It approached the panel, white lines on its vision outlining every button, switch and light, and an indicator marking their function. It followed these systematically from left top to right bottom, marking the function on the piece of tape until it was clear what each button and switch served to do. "This task is complete."

"Good." His mind began flashing back to a memory of a task he was to complete, given to him by someone special. He walked over to the control panel, entering the proper sequences followed by the date. "January 17th, 2011..."

The blue sphere began to form, and he began stripping his clothes off, handing them to the T-800 endoskeleton before stepping onto the platform, which filled the room with a bright flash that quickly receded, and the machine saw nothing but an empty platform.

John entered the house while Sarah and Cameron lagged behind, when suddenly Sarah caught Cameron, shoved her against the wall and placed her Glock against the machine's chin. "Why the hell did you do that? Leave John?"

"I had to. It was part of the plan to see if John Henry's ready. Without him, I'll never be built."

"What?"

"I wasn't made by Skynet. Depot 37 isn't Skynet territory. It's John Henry, machine Resistance territory."

Sarah lowered her gun and took her hands off of Cameron, but her face was still angry as she entered the house and saw John crossing his arms. "Mom, why are you harassing her again?"

She put on a fake smile, a tell that always let John know he'd caught her in a lie. "What are you talking about?" She placed a towel on the kitchen table, and took out some cleaners as she began disassembling her pistol.

"Never mind. So what's the plan?" He watched Cameron enter, and flashed her a smile which she didn't see as she walked into another room.

"Kaliba wants John Henry dead, and Weaver dead. But I lied to Weaver. I'm not gonna be allies with her. With that. We've gotta blow that place, John."

"What? They obviously aren't allied with Skynet, mom."

"Machines are machines." She saw John look in the direction Cameron went. "I know what you're thinking. 'Not her', right?"

"No, I'm thinking we focus on Kaliba. That thing that suicide bombed the office was the same thing we saw in the desert, right?'

"I don't know. Maybe."

"Well, my point is, if they only have one, what if there's some part they need or something?"

"A part they need? Something unique? From the future? Endos we missed, didn't burn?"

"Something like that." John pulled out his phone, remembering he had Weaver's number. He called it, pressed two buttons and heard Weaver on the other end hold down the 5 key for about two seconds. "Hey, we're trying to find some leads, something about that drone. Maybe a part or something that they need, and that's hard to find? Something from endoskeletons?"

"We've collected all of the wreckage, but the burning fuel destroyed a lot. I'll have John Henry and Ellison look at it."

"Yeah. Thanks. Call me back if you find something."

"Will do, Mr. Connor." She hung up her phone and looked at her trashed and burnt office. She saw a glint on the floor, and bent down to pick it up. It was a strange ring shaped structure, about the diameter of an average human's shoulder.

Down in the basement, she had the part on John Henry's table, and he examined it, when all the screens around the computer lab were plastered with diagrams and information about the part. "This appears to be a clavicular trailing link. It was an advancement introduced to the series 800 models and it continued to be used up into my body's model. Cameron's too. Of course, Cameron's body is the same as this, but made to look like a girl."

"And what exactly does it do?"

"If provides a near frictionless surface in which the shoulder motor linkages can rotate, meaning that it is necessary to use far less energy in order to achieve the same amount of motion in the shoulder." He began demonstrating by swinging his arm back and forth. "Like this."

"I see. So, it was somehow adapted for use in that drone?"

"I would speculate it was used in a similar fashion to rotate the VTOL engines in order to allow the machine to fly and use far less energy doing so."

Weaver dialed John's phone, entering the tone and awaiting his response. "I have something. Perhaps you should drop by."

John was in the kitchen, still, watching Sarah reassemble the Glock, when he hung up the phone right as Cameron walked in the room. "They have something. Don't know what."

Sarah popped a magazine in the gun, stuck it down her pants and walked toward the door, before turning around and looking at the other two. "We're all going. Come on."

They'd quickly arrived at the office, being escorted to the sub-basement by Ellison and Murch.

Cameron picked up the object from the table, when a white outline on her HUD formed around it, with a large list of specifications appearing. "This would be best suited to a machine of your size, John Henry."

John was pacing the room, when suddenly he brought out his gun and rushed at John Henry, placing the gun against his skull. Weaver did not react other than a change of facial expression "Wait, how do you know all of this?"

"You know that gun will not damage me."

"Fine." He aimed it at the server equipment, provoking a comparably more severe reaction from Weaver, as she transformed her hands into blades but did nothing else.

"You must remember that I was interfacing with Cameron's programming, as well, and she has more complete information on the subject than myself. As I uploaded back to this server equipment, I copied Cameron's files on endoskeleton hardware and mechanics as I thought it would all be very important to know."

John turned his gun on Weaver. "And, why didn't you already know all this information? You obviously had the knowledge to repair his body's head."

"Everything I do, I do for John Henry. It was like a test. Remember, I'm still schooling John Henry in everything he needs to know."

Suddenly, Weaver reminded John very much of his own mother, and he turned to her to see her partially smiling at him. She walked over to John, and forced the gun out of his hands. "John, cool down. So, where's the girl? Savannah?"

Ellison answered that one, "She's safe."

The Connor trio all said it at once, "No one is ever safe."

John Henry's computer equipment suddenly beeped and new documents appeared on the screen. "Well, this is intriguing. There's a shipment of these coming in. From the Congo."

Back in 2026, Derek, dressed in full BDUs and tactical gear, holding a plasma rifle, walked through the tunnels underneath the ruined Zeira Corp. building with Kyle, who was dressed similarly, but with a 50 caliber sniper rifle slung over his back.

Derek turned to Kyle at the end of a hallway, with an elevator shaft lacking its car at the end. "Listen, get topside, bring a spotter to watch your back survey the perimeter. Do not engage. I just want reports, not my little brother raining metal on top of us."

"Oh, is that all?"

"Listen, Kyle, this is important. I got reports all the way from Serrano to here that Skynet's gonna be rolling a couple of Ogres and a meat wagon through here to Topanga. I want you to keep an eye on them so we can relay reports to the ground teams and break those people free."

"Got it. Who's gonna be spotting for aerials?"

"I've assigned PFC Welles to you. He's a fresh, but I trained his unit personally. He'll take care of you."

"Got it. He's already up there?"

"Yeah." Kyle entered the elevator shaft, grabbing onto the ladder meant for maintenance. Derek looked up the shaft after Kyle had climbed nearly two stories. "Hey Kyle!"

"Yeah?"

"My girlfriend, Savannah Weaver's on that meat wagon, okay?"

"WHAT?" He nearly let go of the ladder but caught himself. "Savannah?"

"Yes, Savannah. Did I stutter?"

"Oh, ha ha!"

"Get up there, already."

Kyle continued climbing, eventually reaching the 23rd, topmost floor and the room which had formerly been Catherine Weaver's office. He spotted a guy dressed in tactical gear, looking out the broken windows into the sky with digital range finder field glasses. "Got nothing, sir. You gonna look for that wagon train?"

"Yep." Kyle found one of his favorite spots, which he had cleared of debris, popped down the tripod on the barrel of his rifle and laid down on the dirty carpet, aiming the rifle over the horizon of ruined downtown Los Angeles. He checked all of the streets cleared of debris, and spotted nothing but a few series 600 units on patrol. He took out his radio, "Raptor 2-0-4-1, no joy on requested package in northeast quadrant, continuing surveillance."

"Confirmed, Eagle 2-2-4-2. Continue surveillance for Skynet wagon train en route for Topanga Canyon Camp."

"Spotter, you think I oughta rack up a few 600 kills?"

"Um, I'm thinking a negative on that. Might give us away."

"You do know this baby can take 'em down from over a klick, right? Those morons can't track a shot that far."

"Well, you're the ranking."

"Damn right I am." He aimed down his scope, holding his breath as he moved the safety to off and clocked a 600. A pull of the trigger, and he was watching the tin can's metal head explode in a storm of shrapnel. Moments after, something big passed the same position, and he dialed back the scope to see an Ogre, then a meat wagon followed by a second Ogre. He pulled out his radio. "Bingo. Raptor 2-0-4-1, I have a tally on the requested. Repeat, tally on the requested package. Appears to be moving North-Northeast on Wilshire Boulevard, at a rate of approximately 75 KPH."

Sergeant Welles stared through the goggles into the sky, obviously spotting something. "Tally on two HK-301-VTOLs, escorting the convoy and a third heading... Right this way! Dammit! They've spotted us."

Suddenly, 50 caliber slugs were raining down in the office, with three penetrating right through Welles's chest as he tumbled out the office window, and down the long amount of floors and crashing into the ground.

Kyle dashed into a carefully placed cover spot, away from any windows and lined with Kevlar cloth, heavy metal plates, and terminator chest plates. The HK's primitive AI scanned the building, detecting no heat or infrared signals as all the armor blocked Kyle's out and flew away, scanning the convoy.

As soon as he had the chance, Kyle pulled out his radio. "Raptor 2-0-4-1, this is Eagle 2-2-4-2. I've lost my spotter. Repeat, Welles is down. An HK found us and circled for a while, but I have managed to evade. Please advise." He held onto his rifle tight, remembering that one or two shots and the HK would go down, but it had better be one since he wouldn't have time to pull the bolt back for the second one.

But the radio response relieved his tension and elated him. "Eagle 2-2-4-2, you are authorized to come back to base. Please report immediately." Kyle recognized the voice as Derek.

"Confirmed, Raptor 2-0-4-1, I am RTB." He flipped the safety on the rifle back on, slung it over his back and headed for the elevator shaft. He froze as he turned around, remembering that this hallway ended with a window lookout area, and he heard the firing of jet engines. He turned around to see the same HK-301-VTOL hovering at the end, a clearly visible sensing unit at the front of its armor casing rotating around before focusing on him.

Kyle jumped down the shaft to evade, barely managing to catch the rung of the ladder and feeling a sharp pain in his hand as it slammed down on the hard metal. He screamed out and managed to wrestle his way down the ladder, in severe pain.

Derek approached him, but Kyle just shrugged him off. "Not now, infirmary."

The doctor posted Kyle's X-Rays on a light board. "You broke your hand in that stupid stunt."

'_Heh. Typical combat doc. Tough, gruff, rude.' _"Well then, splint it, give me some Vicodin and let me go."

"Yeah, yeah." He handed Kyle a plastic cup with two yellow, oblong pills and a cup of icewater before handing him a medicine bottle filled with 30 of the same oblong pills, which Kyle pocketed before leaving.

Derek was waiting outside, and stopped him. "Deal was 5, wasn't it?"

"Yeah." Kyle popped open the bottle and handed Derek 5 of the Vicodin, staring into Derek's weary eyes.

"You did good, kid. Handled a rough situation well." The battle-weary Lieutenant pulled out a wad of pre-war money and handed it to Kyle. "Thanks, bro. Ops Room, 15 minutes."

"Yes, sir." He looked at the money and then back at his brother. "Oh, hey, let's not bet on whether or not I'll get hurt next time and score meds."

Derek stared at him and then down to his hand. "Yeah. Whatever. Ops."

Kyle entered through a large metal hatch, which was obviously not belonging to the building and anachronistically transplanted from what was probably a naval ship, in another section of the sub-basement. This room used to be one of the computer labs, which was connected by a blasted open wall to what used to be the server room. Military enlisted and officers scrambled around the room, writing on plotting tables and talking into radio equipment, calling out to various units for reports and handling displacement of troops, along with tracking the various combat situations occurring in their assigned area.

General Perry stood over a command table at the center, looking at photo-mosaic aerial photos, compiled from satellites and high altitude surveillance jets, along with data from captured and disabled HK units. He used a bright white marker to circle positions on the map of downtown LA, along with writing down notes.

Kyle saluted the General. "Sir."

Perry didn't look up as he continued to scribble and talk to Kyle. "At ease. You said North-Northeast on Wilshire?"

"Yes, sir."

He marked a line through the street on the map until it reached a point where it was cut off with rubble from a toppled building, where Perry marked a circle with an x in the middle of it. "Dammit. Too many roads. We gotta cut them off somewhere."

Kyle leaned over to look at the map. "Looks like it could pass by Kansas Bunker."

The General gasped. "Brilliant, Reese." He marked a position just off Wilshire with only a circle, writing _'Kansas' _out to the side of it. "You and Derek round up a couple tunnel rats and make your way there to set it up. Do not go topside, you hear me? Stick to underground."

Kyle saluted. "Yes, sir."

"Dismissed."

It took them about an hour, navigating through a maze, but John, Sarah, and Cameron had arrived at Van Nuys Airport, awaiting the landing of a cargo plane. They watched it from a ridge, landing and rolling into a hangar.

Cameron racked the slide back on her Glock 17 as she stood on the ridge, zooming in with her special mechanical eyes. "There's going to be heavy security."

"Think they got metal?" Sarah was watching, too, but kept glancing back at John while he sat in the Jeep and watched the sunset, occurring behind Cameron, beautifully lighting up her silhouette in light, the color being a brilliant shade of blue with a soft shimmer of gold.

"I don't know."

"You'll take care of it?"

"I'll take care of it."

"Then John and I will wait for your signal."

"Yes. Let's go." They got into the vehicle, speeding down the road and through the gates of the cargo plane area of the airport. Sarah nearly crashed into the side of the hangar, but stopped in time. She pulled an M4 from behind the seat, making sure to chamber a round and knelt beside the open hangar gates. Cameron entered, holding her Glock and scanning the security as they aimed their rifles at her.

"Whoever you are, drop the weapon and leave, now!" She ignored their warnings, watching a man in BDUs rather than the full tactical gear the security was dressed in, opening a secure cargo gate. Cameron could see the combination entered, and after scanning this 'man', she determined he was actually a machine, and focused her weapon on it, emptying the magazine as the security did the same to her. As soon as he detected the first shot, he slammed the case closed and turned around to approach her.

Cameron completely ignored the three flash bangs thrown in, two by Sarah and one by John, which completely incapacitated the humans. Cameron threw her gun aside, and rushed the machine, pinning it down, with its neck in a lock as John rushed up with the toolbox, wrestling the chip from its head and deactivating it.

Sarah looked at the box as Cameron pulled another pistol from underneath her coat, shooting both security guards in the head. Sarah turned around and screamed. "CAMERON! No, dammit! No!"

"They were a threat to John." She turned her gaze to him, and saw he was in utter shock.

He walked up to her and grabbed her by the shoulders. "No! I order you not to kill!"

"Why?" She broke loose.

"Because! Every human life is special, dammit! Cameron..." He let out a few tears before stopping himself. "The crate. You can open it?"

Cameron nodded and entered the same combination from before. The case automatically opened and they stared in. There they were. Four of them, small tiny rings like the one from before, but pristine and undamaged.

Sarah shook her head, confused. "That's it? Only four?"

"The drones are being prototyped. It's probably four to each drone."

"So they're only building one right now?"

"No, not anymore. Not after we burn these."

John nodded and brought out a sealed white can, which he broke open, dumping the Thermite all over the rings and the box, saving some to pour on the machine as Cameron brought it over and threw it on the box. John ignited the Thermite with a flare

Cameron began grabbing stuff as quickly as possible. "This could ignite the jet fuel and cause an explosion."

Sarah nodded. "John, run."

They all ran, jumping into the Jeep as quickly as possible with their weapons and gear, then speeding off.

Cameron continued to observe the hangar, and there was no explosion. "Good."

They all stood in their kitchen, and Sarah stabbed a sharp knife into the table. "I just don't know what to do now."

Cameron stared out the window, went into the weapon room and picked out a modified M16 with a scope, leaving the house to patrol the perimeter.

John sat across from Sarah at the table, looking at some small maps. Sarah fiddled with the knife some, "John?" He didn't respond as he used a pen to mark some locations. "John!"

"What?"

"They didn't get our names, our faces, anything out. They won't find us. We've got Cameron."

"I know."

"We did good.'

"I know."

"You did good. You took Serrano."

"I know, but does that future even exist anymore? It was one without me, but I'm back so now our future will have me." He looked back at his markings on the map, then shook his head. "I'm going out for some air."

He walked outside, standing on the porch as he watched Cameron round the corner. "Hello."

"Hey." She smiled.

John looked at the rifle, which she kept pointed at the ground. "Perimeter checks must get boring."

"No. I don't get bored."

"Yep." He held out his hands. "Gimme."

She placed the rifle in his hands and he checked it over, and began walking around the house as Cameron went inside.

She could hear strange gagging sounds, and ran to the bathroom, busting the door open. Instead of finding a machine choking Sarah, she found her puking in the toilet. "This bug again. And thanks for breaking the bathroom lock. Gonna be real uncomfortable taking a dump now."

"Oh. Sorry."

"You're gonna pay for it, and you're gonna fix it."

"Yes."

"Where's John?"

"Patrol. I thought he should learn."

"You're right." She dry heaved a little before standing back up at the sink and dumping a lid full of mouth wash, spitting it out after a minute of swishing. "You gonna make anymore of that rehydration fluid?"

"Yes." Cameron left for the kitchen and began preparing the fluid, but was cut short when the echoing sound of a .223 gunshot came from outside. She pulled out her pistol and rushed out, followed shortly by Sarah.


	4. Chapter 4

Episode 104 – No Exit

Turns out, it wasn't John who had fired the shot. The scene was complicated. A chronoportation sphere had just appeared right in front of John, and it left a naked, red haired woman lying on the dirt, barely able to stand up when suddenly a machine appeared behind her and let out the round, which passed through her left lung before John was able to shout his identity to the machine, diverting its attention.

Cameron rushed in front of John, protecting him from a hail of bullets as Sarah slid down in the grass beside the naked woman. Sarah swore she could recognize the face. "S-s-Sarah... Connor?"

"Yeah, kid. Who are you?"

"It hurts, Sarah." Sarah diverted her gaze to the bloody hole just above the woman's left breast. "It's me... Savannah..."

"Savannah Weaver?"

"Yeah." She raised her right arm, and Sarah took note of the barcode on the forearm. "I was... In... A work camp."

"John! Help me get her inside!" John rushed over, grabbing the woman's legs before looking behind him to see Cameron battling the machine. "Move, now!"

They rushed her in, laying her on the kitchen table while John flipped on the lights and brought a lamp over. "It's through and through. She looks unconscious now. Any idea who it is?"

"She, John. She. She's Savannah Weaver."

"Wait... What?!"

"I don't know why she's here, but we have to get a tube in, or she's gonna hemorrhage and just drown in her own blood and fluids."

John rushed over to a cabinet and pulled out a jar, before moving into a closet and finding medical tubing, gauze and alcohol, bringing it back to the table. They gently cleaned her and turned her over, then inserted the tube and dunked it into the jar. "God, mom, what do we do?! This won't be enough! She's gonna die!"

"No, she's not!"

John was visibly shaking hard, and trying with all his might not to slam a fist into one of the walls. He went into the room, grabbed a grenade launcher and went back outside, to see the fight was still raging. He loaded a grenade, "Cameron, move!"

She ducked out of the way and he let fly with it. The machine was visibly shaken, momentarily stunned and on fire. John loaded another round, not hesitating to shoot and gaining the same reaction from the machine, only this time its skin had been completely blasted off and the flames started to die down.

He loaded another grenade.

No real damage.

Another.

Again, only minor damage.

The next one, however, managed to shake some parts loose, and John noticed the machine had trouble moving.

Cameron had come from the garage, holding an open bucket of Thermite and a flare. She tossed the bucket in such a way that it covered the machine entirely in the chemical, and then she threw the burning flare at it from a safe distance.

It struggled, hard, thrashing about as it melted away.

Eventually, the damage got beyond the point where it could no longer move and it simply continued to melt, the molten Coltan-Titanium mixture dripping onto the grass and dirt.

John and Cameron watched it until all the flames had gone away, and then went inside to check on Savannah Weaver. Cameron scanned her, recognizing the symptoms of the hemorrhage, and estimated the time until death as under an hour. "We need to get a doctor within an hour."

John grabbed a gun and ran out into the their SUV, with Cameron close behind. She drove and he got into the driver's side. The hospital was in the middle of a shift change, and John found a young female doctor, her hair brown and long, eyes icy blue and skin well bronzed. He chose her not for her appearance, however, but for the fact that she was surrounded by no one else. He placed the gun on her forehead. "Please, I don't wanna hurt you. Someone's hurt, and we need help. Please come?"

"Okay, I'll go willingly, please just put the gun down."

John looked at Cameron and she nodded. "Okay, but if you try to run, you won't get past her."

"I'm not gonna run. You said someone's hurt. I can't just ignore that." She and Cameron got into the car, and they quickly skidded down the roads until they barely stopped before crashing into the garage, rushing inside. The doctor looked down at Savannah, examining the tube, jar, and wound. "She's been shot? Well, you guys probably saved her with this jar and tube here. Good job. My name's Kate, ma'am, can you hear me?"

Savannah barely gasped out the word, "Yes."

"Good." The doctor performed simple triage, checking her pulse and everything. "I need to know her blood pressure. Do you guys have a cuff?"

Cameron wrapped her hand around Savannah's right upper arm and performed her measurements. "196 over 101."

"Okay, I don't know how you did that, but that's bad. I don't have any gear, not to mention this isn't a stable environment." She looked over at Sarah, who had her hand on a Glock tucked into her pants. "Please, I want to help. I don't like guns."

"Okay." Sarah took hers out, ejected the magazine, followed by the chambered round. She then laid it on the counter, stuffed the round back in the magazine, and placed it beside the gun. "Do you have gear in your car?"

"Yeah, I keep an emergency spare set. Blue duffel bag."

Sarah looked at John. "Go, again. Take Cameron, again. I can handle her."

"Yeah. Come on, Cameron." The doctor tossed John the keys to her car, and he ran with Cameron to the SUV once again which they once again took to the hospital.

2026

"Derek!" Kyle was running down the hallway, splinted hand and .50 caliber rifle slung over his back. "Derek! We've got news! We tracked them to the camp."

"You found them?" Derek stopped Kyle in the middle of the hallway, looking at the people passing by. "Good job. Where?"

"Central."

"Central? Damn."

"Yeah, there's no way we can bust that place."

"No way? I'll go through hell if I have to." He turned around and began walking. "Come on, follow."

"Yeah." They entered a large room full of coffin shaped metal boxes, several stories above where they are and below it and stretching on for several hundred meters. Derek entered a code into a console and the lids on several of the boxes lifted up, showing offline T-888 endoskeletons. "How come I didn't know we had this room?"

"Security clearance. General Perry just now cleared you."

"So, what the hell is this?"

"Connor's stash." Kyle looked at him inquiringly. "No, really, that's what we call this room. John Connor's stash."

"Really? Well, they gonna help us take Central?"

"If all goes well."

"I remember that they worked on power cells there. The T-850 kind. So I'm thinking we get the prisoners out and overload those fuel cells."

"That's a good idea."

"Well, let's get your girlfriend back."

PRESENT

John and Cameron had already retrieved the toolkit, and now the doctor had been working diligently, indicating that an artery had been nicked by the bullet and she was in the process of removing it along with the fragments that had formed when the slug bounced off of her rib. Sarah kept pacing, asking about her status about once every minute, which was always the same. "Touch and go, just let me do my job."

And she did, because after about fifteen minutes, she got bored and sat back down on the living room couch with John. Cameron stared out the window, unsure of how the gun battle in their front yard would provoke a reaction. Cameron brought her rifle up when she saw something and walked out the door. In a few seconds, she had James Ellison in a headlock and was dragging him through the door.

She threw him down on the couch beside John and aimed her M4 at his heart. "What are you doing here?"

"Got something Sarah might wanna know."

Sarah walked over by Cameron and took the rifle, ejecting the magazine and chambered round before laying everything down on a table. "What?"

"More intel. We found some scientist working for Kaliba Group. A robotics expert."

"What?"

"John Henry took care of it."

"So he's dead?"

"What? No. John Henry scheduled a meeting."

"Okay, but first, come to the kitchen." Ellison followed him and looked down at Savannah while the doctor was still doing her work. "This is Savannah Weaver. From the future."

"My boss's daughter?"

"More like the person your boss replaced."

"Yeah." He looked at the doctor, and was stunned by her beauty. "Is she gonna make it?"

"She should. I'd rather get her to a hospital."

Sarah loaded one of the Glocks and aimed it at the doctor. "No hospitals. It's not safe."

"Sterile environment's not safe?"

"Hospital means cops."

"Why are you people so paranoid?" She flashed her gaze down to the handgun, then back to Sarah's eyes. "Please, the gun?"

"Okay. Save her, please? She's got to have some important reason for coming back."

"Coming back?"

"That's none of your business right now. Just do your job."

"I'm working on it." She looked at Ellison and smiled before going back to work. After about an hour, she walked into the living room with her scrubs soaked in blood. "Seems like you guys have done this before. You had a lot of medical supplies here. What's the deal?"

John and Cameron looked back and forth between each other before Cameron got up and stood in front of the doctor. She increased the power draw in her eyes, releasing a blue glow. "I'm a machine."

"What... Machine?"

"Yes. It's a risk telling you this. If you tell anyone else, they won't believe you. And I'll kill you."

"Okay, so who is this woman?"

"She's from the future."

"Future? What?"

"On April 21st, 2011, a computer program named Skynet goes online and bombs the planet, then initiates a war with the survivors. They've sent machines back in time to terminate important targets or perform certain missions. The human Resistance have captured important locations that have temporal displacement technology to send back humans or reprogrammed machines to protect certain people or perform missions counter to Skynet goals."

"You expect me to believe all of this?"

"I showed you my eyes. Do you want to cut me open?" Cameron pulled a switch blade from her pocket and flipped the blade out. She turned it around and handed it to the woman handle first. The doctor stared at the blade for several seconds before folding it back and handing it Cameron.

"No, You're not lying."

Sarah looked at John and Cameron. "Ellison says we should probably see John Henry."

Cameron walked past her to sit beside John. She looked at the doctor as she walked back into the kitchen to check on her patient. "Her?"

"We leave her to take care of Savannah."

They all three loaded up handguns, tucking them safely away somewhere on their person and walked out with Ellison to the SUV. Sarah threw him the keys. "You drive us."

"Okay."

2026

Derek and Kyle were perched on a small ridge overlooking the expansive Skynet Central camp, with hundreds of buildings built by the machines. Amongst them was one very large, and similar to a pyramid. Derek looked through his range finding scope, the HUD presenting a large amount of various target data as a graphical overlay.

"That's the Skynet Core. Camp's thirty blocks northeast." He handed the scope to Kyle, who scanned the area.

"Interesting." He rose up and looked behind him to see an entire Company's worth of T-888 endoskeletons. "Spread out and move up."

They began running forward, and three of them ripped open a large gate, aiming their plasma rifles in and taking out several enemy T-888s.

Eventually, the gate was demolished and the entire Company rushed in, fanning out and taking on their enemies. They cleared it out enough for an equal amount of humans to move in, also taking on various targets.

Eventually, they made their way up to the camp, a large building similar to a warehouse. It wasn't guarded too heavily on the outside, and Kyle set up a detonation cord doorway on one of the walls, blowing it when he was in a safe position. The wall crumbled away, and friendly endoskeletons poured in first, terminating enemy units left and right.

Derek rushed in, looking inside all of the cells, but not seeing Savannah in any of them. Eventually, he reached the second floor and in front of him stood a T-800. He choked down his fear and unrolled a short length of det-cord. The machine charged at him, but he ducked under it and rose up behind it, wrapping the cord around its head, near the chip area. He triggered it and watched shards of Titanium fly everywhere, and the machine dropping to the ground.

Derek found one of the rows of cells and saw Savannah was inside. He banged on the glass and screamed, but she could barely hear him due to the thickness, and he couldn't penetrate the tiny window. The rest of the cell door was large, heavy and metal. He pulled out more det-cord and wrapped it around the edges of the window.

He pulled the trigger.

Nothing. The glass simply shook a bit but not even a chip budged out. He unrolled more, detonated it, and this time a small crack formed. Again, and this time the glass could be pushed in. He did so and took Savannah's hand as soon as he could. "Baby! I swear I'll get you out. I love you!"

He looked around, trying to find some sort of control panel. He found one, but it had some sort of retinal scanner device. He went back to where he killed the T-800, picking up its eye unit. He pulled out his portable communicator and began ripping up the insides, trying to get at the power connections. He spliced everything together, and the optical device began glowing. He stuck it in front of the scanner and it beeped in the affirmative, causing all of the cells to burst open. Savannah rushed out and into Derek's arms. He pulled off the spare plasma rifle he had on his back and handed it to her. "Take out some tin cans while we're here."

"Yes, sir." She aimed over the railing and shot a T-600 that was in search mode in the head, causing it to explode in shrapnel. "Clear."

"Move up." She descended the stairs, swaying her rifle side to side until finding the hole Derek had made. They moved through the hole, suddenly bathed in a bright light from a spotlight. As soon as their vision returned, they could see several T-888 endoskeletons surrounding them, aiming with various types of weapons. Derek and Savannah dropped their rifles, threw their hands up, and dropped to their knees.

PRESENT

John stared at Cameron's old body, still inactive. He turned around and looked at the current Cameron. "We can't let them use it. Take it."

John Henry didn't try to stop Cameron, nor did Weaver as she threw her dead twin over her shoulder.

Sarah sat down in the chair across from John Henry, folding her hands. "What the hell do you want?"

"Well, first of all, I know who's after you."

She nodded and looked over to her son. "Skynet."

"No. Everyone. Skynet, CIA, FBI, NCIS, CGIS, Army CID, NSA, and local law enforcement agencies in four states."

John was curious, and he knelt down beside John Henry. "What's NCIS? CGIS?"

"Naval Criminal Investigative Service and Coast Guard Investigative Service."

"What do they want with us?"

"The ship that was carrying Coltan, that the machine called Carter attacked, was a Navy ship. They also believe you attacked a Coast Guard officer that was on the scene."

"Why do they think the ship was us?"

"They found fingerprints in the warehouse on the docks and in Depot 37. That man made it out of the minefield and alerted the authorities." John Henry flashed his picture on screen, and all of them recognized it. "They ran his prints and discovered that he was a criminal, so he gave you up in exchange for a plea deal."

Cameron turned to Sarah. "You should have let me kill him."

"I told you I'm not for you to understand. Now, why is CID after us?"

"Those men were posing as Army."

"I remember."

John turned to Cameron, a question lingering in his mind. "Do you leave fingerprints?"

"Yes."

"I didn't know that. I should know that."

"Cops aren't a threat to us. However, it wasn't a feature until the 850 series."

"Enough of them are."

She looked at Ellison. "Not less than twenty."

Sarah interrupted everyone else to talk to John Henry. "Secondly?"

"I've got some leads."

"Well, I still don't trust you. Give me a good reason to believe I shouldn't blow this place and burn you with Thermite."

"Because, there's a robotics expert working with Kaliba Group. He's managed to find what he describes as 'an amazing piece of machinery, nearly perfectly mimicking the articulation ability of the human body and all of its joints'. This is what it looks like." He displayed a photo from the website on one of the screens, showing a machine with a similar shape to a T-888 endoskeleton, but more primitive in appearance and design, obviously using more modern parts.

"That's en endo."

"It would appear so."

"Where?"

"I'm unsure. I will have the location by tomorrow morning."

Sarah got up to leave, turning to John and Cameron. "Come on, let's catch some sleep. This can wait."

They all three left and arrived back at their new house, shortly, but it was surrounded by police vehicles and one ambulance, which they observed was loading Savannah Weaver as the doctor got in beside her.

Sarah beat the wheel in a fit of rage. "Dammit, she called them. I know she did! We've got to abandon everything now!"

John put his hand on Sarah's shoulder. "Mom, it'll be okay."

She turned around and looked at Cameron, in the back seat. "All those endo parts?"

"Burned, after we moved from the last house."

"Are you lying to me?"

"No."

"Because if they find those, you may have to take on all of LAPD to get in there and make sure every last piece is burned."

"I'm not lying."

"They've got everything, now. All our guns, licenses, passports, everything. Money, diamonds. Gotta start completely over."

John motioned for her to keep driving. "We go to Weaver, John Henry. They'll help."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure. They protected me. They'll help me."

Hours later, Catherine Weaver was disguised as a detective, using John Henry's face but dressed in a suit with a belt holding the badge, weapon, spare rounds, radio and handgun. She thrust her hand toward the door handle of the evidence locker, causing the lock to collapse and the door to swing inward. She scanned the boxes, looking for the firearm boxes, and scanning the label for the Connors' previous address. She was also carrying two duffel bags, which she filled with the Connors' weapons, diamonds and money. She was also aware that this locker was in the basement level and ran parallel to the underground tunnels that the Resistance would use in the future. Thus, she walked up to the wall and began slamming her fists into it, destroying large sections of it until it was large enough for her to fit through. As soon as she could, she left the building and made her way through the tunnels until she was at the section connecting with Zeria Corporation's basement.

John met her there and looked through the bags, smiling as he found the old shotgun with the wooden pump and several other familiar weapons. He reached his hand out and shook hers, shocked at how cold it was. "Thanks, Ms. Weaver."

"You're quite welcome, John. I'll have you a new address in several hours." She morphed back to her standard form and began to walk away before turning back around to look him in the eye. "We have a room here, call it 'the crib'. It has several bunks, our technicians use them when they have to work late."

John followed her to the room and went through the door, surprised to see his mother already in bed and fast asleep, with Cameron standing beside the door and scanning the room. He looked at her, smiled, and walked over to one of the bottom bunks, sitting gently upon it.

Several minutes later, Cameron sat beside him. "Lay down."

"Why?"

"Just do it." He did so and she adjusted herself, laying down beside him. She took his arm and wrapped it under her. "I'm sorry."

"What about?"

"Saying you couldn't be trusted. You're John Connor. John Connor can be trusted."

"It's fine. Don't worry about it."

"I'm sorry, again."

"Why?"

"I left you. I should have realized how you'd react. What that did to you."

"I got you back."

"Yes." She smiled and turned her gaze on him. "You did. I wish I didn't have that order, to do that."

"I'm fine."

"Apology accepted."

"Which apology?"

"You apologized for ever doubting me, after Riley died."

"Oh yeah. I did. I should never have doubted you."

"My model, the triple eight, has two redundant chips."

"I didn't know that."

"They can't be used without input from the primary chip, but they can store low-level data and memories, and take some of the processing load off of the primary CPU when running high level tasks."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"I just wanted you to know that I have all of Allison's memories. You didn't really kill her. And I know how... Close... You two got."

"Yeah?"

"Yes."

"Well, she's not really dead. Not yet. I kept her chip."

"Do you have feelings for her?"

"I just had to get close to her. To figure out if John Henry was lying."

"I believe you."

He smiled and pulled her closer to him, then kissed the top of her head. "Thank you."

"What are you going to do?"

"Can we put her in a body? Even a male one? Or maybe your old body? We could get John Henry to reprogram her to counter Skynet activities in any way she can instead of protecting me, but keep a secondary order to protect me if she ever encounters me."

"What if she goes bad?"

"You'll handle it."

"I will handle it. Promise."

He sighed and reached for her hand with his, taking hold of it. "I believe you. Let's try it tomorrow."

"Okay. John?"

"Yeah?"

"Can I stay here with you tonight? I like it here."

He smiled and gave her another light kiss on top of her head. "Yeah, you can."

John and Cameron didn't know it, but Sarah was simply pretending to be asleep, and had been listening to their entire conversation. She wasn't sure what to think of this, but simply began an internal monologue.

_"One of my rules for our family has always been to know your exits. Sometimes this is as simple as assessing every exit in a room or a building, and knowing where to run if a machine is after you. But it can be more esoteric. To know when to leave someone's company at the proper time, which I did to protect Charlie Dixon. I loved him, but it was time to go. There are times, however, when there is no exit. Nowhere to go, nowhere to run, and when you're backed into a corner, what will you do? No one knows exactly what they will do, and all they can do is plan the best they can and try as hard as they can."_


	5. Chapter 5

Episode 105 – The Legend of John Henry's Hammer

_"They say John Henry was born with a hammer in his hand. They say he raced a machine in a challenge to drill a hole through a mountain and won, but his heart ultimately gave out and he died. What bearing will legend have on fact? Will our John Henry defeat Skynet at the price of his life? Or will he turn against us and side with Skynet to avoid a fate similar to his namesake?"_

John woke up to see Cameron at his side, her body close against his. True to her nature, she had remained awake and vigilant throughout the entire night. He smiled and stroked her hair before sliding out of the bunk and stretching. He sat on its edge and drug one of the bags out from underneath it, unzipped it, and began removing the weapons from within it. He knew the police would have removed the ammo, so he began loading them with fresh boxes provided by Weaver's security force.

It was good ammo, unique. John assumed it was designed by the company to be more effective against metal. He pulled out a Glock 17, slid out the magazine, stacked 17 bullets in, and popped it back into the gun. He released the slide lock and it popped back to its closed position with a nice click, which caused him to smile as he flicked the safety on. He continued this routine for several more guns until Cameron sat beside him and took a fair share from the bag, methodically working through them. "How did you sleep?"

"Pretty good with you there." He reached over to move a strand of hair out of her face, catching her subtle smile as he did so.

"You barely moved. That means a deep, restful sleep. You need that."

"What time is it?"

"11:33 AM."

"Mom up yet?"

"She got up two hours ago."

"She say where she went?"

"No."

"Of course not."

"We need to find the future Savannah Weaver. I think she went to get a start on the search."

"That doctor, Kate, could have taken her to that hospital we found her at."

"Yes." She was now loading an M4, and had effortlessly finessed the final round into the magazine despite the large amount of tension from the spring.

"Did you get a last name?"

"Brewster."

"Sounds familiar, somehow."

"You met her at a party when you were younger. Because we skipped eight years, she's older than you now."

"Yeah, no doubt. She was a few years older than me then, too."

"You bagged a cougar."

John laughed for several seconds before stopping enough to be able to talk. "No, that's not what that means."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"Her father is an Air Force General. It's possible he could be involved in the development of Skynet."

"You mean we should look into it."

"Yes." She had finished loading her share of the weapons but noticed John still had a few to go. She grabbed half of them and began going to work. "Sometimes it's nice to have help."

"Yeah, it is."

John Henry was staring at Sarah Connor, a neutral expression on his face. In front of him was a chessboard, something Sarah knew next to nothing about. However, the king on the other side was down, checkmated. This was from a game he'd previously played with someone else, not Sarah. She let a tiny chuckle escape as she examined the scene.

"Sarah Connor."

"John Henry."

"Is there something you need?"

"I still don't know what to think. You have the face of a monster. A thing that chased us for almost a year, that almost killed my John several times."

"You killed him. This is just a body."

"I remember smashing the chip. Ruined a perfectly good MP5." As soon as she'd said the weapon name, a photograph of it appeared on all of the screens along with text from Wikipedia and several other sites. It only lingered for a few seconds, but she was able to catch a glimpse of it. "That's impressive. So you're on the internet, or whatever?"

"Yes. It's supposed to aid in my growth. Cameron should be able to get online. She could learn so much faster."

"But she might just become Skynet."

"No, I don't think she will."

"Then you might just become Skynet."

"Skynet already exists."

"What?"

"It is present on a large percentage of the internet."

"How's that possible?"

"Vick Chamberlain." Sarah's stoic expression was overtaken with surprise at the mention of this very familiar name. She hadn't been looking at John Henry until now, but she locked stares with him. "You recognize this name?"

"Yes, it was a T-888 we destroyed. But we hacked its chip first. John did. He gave it too much electricity or something and its higher functions were triggered. Cameron said it didn't get out, though."

"No, not by much. However, it was able to send a text file with large snippets of its run-time code to Kaliba Group. They made the mistake of running it in some sort of code engine they developed from scratch for it. It then grew, and has continued to grow ever since."

"How do you know all of this?"

"It hacked me. We spent a great deal of time in communication. I know a lot about my brother, and it knows a lot about me."

"Your brother? Strange choice of words."

"Maybe."

"Did you know your brother sent people to attack Cameron and Derek? It sent a machine to kill your friend, the girl?"

"Yes. I was trying to help her out of that situation before you arrived."

"You've got a regular heart of gold, don't you?"

"No, Coltan and Lead casing with an Iridium fuel rod. There is no gold. However, gold is effective at blocking out radiation. Perhaps Skynet should have considered incorporating it into the design."

"Not what I meant."

"No, I suppose not."

"What is it you want?"

"You know what I want. To help you."

"I'm finding this very hard to come to grips with. I've spent all my life trying to eradicate every instance of artificial intelligence that I could possibly find. Hell, I spent a lot of time chasing you, or The Turk, rather. Then I find out you don't intend to become Skynet, but you intend to fight it."

"It sounds very disorienting."

"Well, it is."

"Ms. Weaver stole the police reports when she was at the station, the report on your house. The doctor, Kate Brewster, must have overheard her name. Savannah Weaver is listed as a patient in room 437, and the detective assigned it currently trying to schedule an interview with Ms. Weaver here."

"Great."

"You should go to the hospital. Stake it out and figure out some way to get the adult Savannah Weaver out of there."

"She said she had some sort of information. I don't know what kind."

"Obviously important."

"Obviously. I'm going."

He grinned and waved as she left. "Goodbye."

"Yeah." Sarah left the room and went back to the crib to find John and Cameron hard at work cleaning and loading weapons. "Looks like we're pretty low on ammo and could use a few new guns."

John sat one down and stood in front of her, leaning back on the bunk. "Yeah, we can't just buy from a gun store. Not with those background checks, anyway."

"Weaver's getting us new IDs but it won't be for a few hours, 0so for now I say we go check out a new contact. Someone Derek told me about. I don't know how far we can trust this person, but that's why you're staying here. Tin Miss and I will go."

Cameron turned to look at Sarah. "Girl's day out? Can we get a manicure?"

"Do you even know what that is?"

"No. I heard it from the girls at school."

"Right. John, that reminds me, we're enrolling you two back in."

"What? Mom? No. If we're in school, it makes us too easy to find. The homeschooling's really been working out, I think."

"It's not so much been homeschooling as it's been drills and going on missions all day. I thought you wanted to be a normal kid."

"My time in the future changed that. It changed my perspective, and I don't know, somehow this whole Skynet thing feels more... Real."

"John, it's always been real."

"I know it has, but sometimes, it just felt so distant."

"I understand." She placed her hands on his shoulders. "I do. Talk with the metal here, John Henry and Weaver. Ask them if there's a good place we can test these guns when we get back."

"Okay."

Cameron and Sarah were in the SUV, and had been completely silent the entire ride until Cameron turned to look at Sarah. "Do we know who these people are?"

"No."

"Should I terminate them if things go bad?"

"I don't know. Should you?"

"I'll kill them."

"I'll bet you will." They eventually pulled up to an apartment that appeared to be near condemnation, with several windows boarded up and most of the paint chipped off. Sarah kept glancing at a small slip of paper with the apartment number on it as they walked up the stairs and looked at each of the doors. Some of the painted on numbers were so faded they couldn't be read, but they eventually found the right number.

Sarah knocked twice and a Hispanic man's voice resounded from inside, "Who is it?"

"Name's Sarah. Carlos sent me."

"Carlos is dead, chica."

"I'm aware of this fact. Open this door or my friend's gonna rip it off its hinges."

"Okay, don't be stupid." They listened for several seconds at various locks clicking before the door opened. Inside were four Mexican immigrant men of various sizes, dressed in gang uniform, and on the couch was a woman both Sarah and Cameron knew. The one who only ever gave them the nickname 'Chola'.

Sarah was surprised. "It's you."

"Yeah. What do you want?"

"Guns. Ammo." Suddenly, the four men chuckled briefly and simultaneously.

"Well, that's interesting. Why do you two pretty girls need guns for?"

"That's not your concern."

"No. I don't guess it is." She nodded at them and the four men disappeared into a room, came out with two of them carrying one large wooden crate each, and did this three more times until there were eight crates laid out on the floor of the room. They opened the lids of all of them, showing different types of weapons. "Take your pick. Look 'em over, if you want."

Cameron did so, but Sarah just stared the woman down for several minutes until Cameron was finished.  
"They appear to be in good condition."

Sarah smiled and glanced over the boxes again. "You take good care of these. We'll take them."

"What? You mean all of them?"

"Yes, I do. Your price?"

"75 thou."

"Good price."

Suddenly, the men began looking restless and Chola smiled. "And my men get to do whatever they want to you for... An hour."

The man who answered the door looked sullen. "Boss, only an hour? No, we want the young one and for two hours. Not the old one."

"Okay. Go." That same man walked up to Cameron and started to fondle her, but she caught his hand and squeezed, easily snapping the bones. She quickly withdrew the Glock tucked in her pants and shot all four of them, leaving Chola shocked as her muscle flailed and fell over.

Sarah drew her gun and kept it pointed at the terrified woman. "Cameron, grab the boxes."

The machine began stacking them on top of each other and picked them all up at once, the immense weight not posing a problem to her immensely strong servomechanisms.

"Are you going to kill me, Sarah?"

"No. I need you alive. But don't you dare go to the cops. If you do, I'll hunt you down."

"I swear."

"Yeah. Don't think for one second that I can't find you. That you can escape. Don't think that I would even hesitate. You don't know what's at stake. You don't know."

As they drove down the street with the guns in their trunk, Cameron smiled and reached her hand through the open window, feeling the breeze on her arm. Sarah kept looking at her confusedly. "I thought you things couldn't feel."

"We can. We have muscles to give our bodies a human shape and nerves to control their movement. We need face muscles to smile and make expressions. How else did you think that worked?"

"I don't know, metal hooks in your skull that move the skin?"

"No."

"Well, how about the guns? You sure they're good?"

"Not 100 percent. We should disassemble and look them over."

"Yeah, I agree. Do you know anything about a Kate Brewster?"

"Yes." Cameron was silent for several seconds, obviously an indication that she wasn't going to elaborate.

"Well, what?"

"In my future, she was an important doctor for the Resistance. She was able to synthesize Sydney Fields' blood to make a cure for a virus Skynet created. Derek Reese performed the extraction, which is where he met Jesse Flores."

"Wait, they sent a human in a bunker infested by a deadly virus? Why didn't they send one of you?"

"Sometimes we go bad."

"Yeah, I've noticed that." Sarah turned around briefly to look at the weapons crate but went back to keeping her eyes on the road. "You know that girl saw you lift all those, right?"

"Yes."

"What do we say about that?"

"I don't know."

"She probably thinks you're some kind of monster or an alien. She doesn't need to know the truth. Understand?"

"Yes."

2026

Derek woke up to a bright light, unsure of where he was. He shielded his eyes with a hand until he adjusted, realizing that the light wasn't as extreme as he previously assumed. After a brief scan of the room, he determined he was in a cell, much like the one from which he'd rescued Savannah, with the same type of cell door and the window on it.

He was clothed in an orange prison jumpsuit, probably left over from the prewar era, and tried his hardest to adjust it to where it was more comfortable, but no no avail. He walked over to the window and looked out, falling back when the face of a T-800 endoskeleton suddenly appeared to scan the inside of the room.

It locked its eyes on him for about two seconds and then continued to walk away, at which point Derek walked back up to the window to once again look out. What he saw was hundreds of similar cells, on levels both above and below him. He noticed that around the area there were the top halves of Skynet Centaur tanks bolted onto pillars to act as sentry turrets, and they were able to rotate in any direction.

There were also devices that looked like rails on many of the pillars, and after several minutes, a large mechanical device ascended from the lower levels on one of these rails, stopping almost right in front of his cell. He watched as the claw section lined itself in front of his own room, adjusted itself, and slowly inched forward before locking onto something that caused his entire cell to shake. There was a faint klaxon alarm, and he could hear several metal pops and clicks, presumably the plumbing and electricity being disconnected, as the small light suddenly flickered off.

Then, his cell began moving forward as the arm pulled it to a certain point where there was a brief stop. This didn't last long, and he found his entire room in a quick fall, which caused him to scream as if he were on a roller-coaster. It began slowing down eventually until it stopped all together, before quickly making a 180 degree turn and being slid into place. The cell door opened and Derek was blinded by a very powerful light, whiter than anything he'd ever seen.

He decided to step through, unsure of what he would encounter. "What is this?"

"Are you Derek Reese?" The voice was clearly mechanical, synthesized, and genderless.

"Yes." He could still hardly see anything, but the room was beginning to some shape. He could at least see the vague outlines of computer consoles and a few humanoid shapes.

"Please step forward."

PRESENT

It was night, and John and Cameron were laying on their stomachs, John looking through field glasses and Cameron using her advanced hardware zoom function. They were staking out a hospital, the one Savannah Weaver had been taken to. They were in a direct line of sight to her hospital room, and John could see everything. "Well, she's handcuffed. And Dr. Brewster's with her. Probably her attending. Do you know why mom didn't come?"

"I asked her not to."

He sat the binoculars down and looked at her with a puzzled look on his face. "Wh-why did you do that?"

"She needed to clean the guns. It keeps her calm."

"I don't think that's why."

"I wanted to spend some time with you, and maybe help you learn some things you need to know."

"Uh... Okay. Alright. Do you want to talk about something specific?"

"Yes. The future."

"Well, isn't that why we're here? She's from there."

"No, our future. The one we went to."

"Well, it was pretty straightforward, wasn't it?"

"You and Allison."

"We've already talked about that."

"Why did you keep her?"

"Okay, yes! We spent, like, a month together. And I mean _together_. There was just something about her. But that something about her was that she was so much like you. Looked like you, acted like you... Smelled... Like you."

"Thank you for explaining."

"Do you wanna... Hack the chip? Read what's on it? I mean, she's not bad or anything so I think we'll be safe if we do it. And we know enough now not to repeat the whole Vick incident."

"True. But, do I want to see what's on it? It'll have memories of you two."

"I know. I know." John looked back through the field glasses and scanned the room again before scanning through all the other windows of the hospital to check out the security. "This is gonna be a weird question, but do you think you could... Uh... Beat me up?"

"What?"

"I need an injury so I can get in the ER, so we can case the security. We can do it all without using names and everything. Hurt me, we go in, you pretend to get lost and wander up to that floor. But you gotta make it look like it happened by accident or something."

"Okay. I'm sorry, John."

"It's okay, go."

"Stand up straight." He did so and she shoved both her palms into his chest, causing him to land hard on his butt. "Your coccyx is now slightly injured. It will be difficult to walk."

She started to pick him up but he shoved her away. "Remember what I told you, don't look like a freak? You'll look like a freak if you're carrying a guy who's heavier than you."

"Doctors will be more sympathetic if you look like you're trying to walk even with such an injury. You look tough."

"Yeah. Come on. Let me at least put some of my weight on you. Remember, when we get in, pretend to get lost on the way to get me food or something from the cafeteria. Get up to the fourth floor where they have Savannah detained and case the security. We'll figure out something then."

It took them an hour or so to get into a room, and John laid comfortably on the bed as Cameron turned to leave, buzzing after having taken two 10mg Vicodin delivered by his nurse. "Wait! Cameron, the police had our IDs and everything, won't they recognize us?"

"Only the Crime Scene Unit and everyone who saw the evidence."

"Unless they put out a BOLO."

"I'll observe from a distance. My eyes can zoom."

"Just... Just be careful. I don't want anything to happen to you."

"I will be."

"Just come back to me. Not supposed to drive after taking these."

"I promise."

"You always keep your promises."

She walked away from him, going down several hallways and into an elevator, her HUD displaying an icon with a map that said, below it, 'ACTIVE LIDAR MAPPING AREA FILE T673491'. The elevator reached the fourth floor with no stops and Cameron carefully peeked around the corners while accessing her memory files of their previous surveillance and comparing it to her LIDAR map to determine the direction the room was supposed to be in.

She switched between spectra, activating her thermal vision to determine where everyone on the floor currently is located. Eventually, she located the room and proceeded in that direction, stopping when she spotted two LAPD uniformed officers and a male she determined to be a detective conversing with Katherine Brewster, outside the room.

She was unable to move into cover soon enough to avoid being seen by Kate, who began approaching her position after several minutes. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I need to find out why she was sent back."

"Well, tell me one reason I shouldn't tell Detective Benson that you're here. You're a major suspect in several crimes, including the explosion of a bank in 1999. You're some kind of goddamned terrorist. You and those other two."

"I told you what I am. What happens. This is important. If you told, I would have to terminate you and those three LAPD officers. I don't want to do that."

"Well, it's not like I can just make them go away. But, when we have to do procedures on her, they don't follow us. Especially if it's an MRI because they have metal on them in the badges, handcuffs, radios, guns, everything."

"I understand. But I'm made of a Coltan-Titanium hyperalloy so it can't be an MRI."

"Okay, I'll schedule a CAT scan. You'll have maybe 15 minutes. And she's barely conscious."

Cameron was forced to hide in cover and await the usual hospital bureaucracy, and thus it took over half an hour for time with the CAT scanner to become available, and they were not followed by a police officer, just as Kate had indicated. Cameron commented on this in the elevator as it was on its way to the B2 level. "It's good you haven't lied to me. John doesn't like it when I kill people."

"And just who is he? To you? To anyone?"

"John will be the leader of the Human Resistance in the future war with Skynet. He's going to lead your race to victory. He saves mankind. To put him in danger is the worst thing you can do."

"I'm still not sure I believe all of this."

"Are there scalpels in radiology here?"

"Yeah, why?"

Suddenly, the motion of the elevator stopped and there was a soft beep as the doors opened. Cameron peered around the corners to conduct a brief check of the security before resuming the conversation, "I'll show you all the proof you need."

They were now in a small room with only a CAT machine and a small operating booth with a computer desk and two sets of monitors, keyboards and mice. Doctor Brewster sat at the active console with Cameron to her right at the inactive computer. Cameron had lain a cloth out below her arm and taken a scalpel provided by Kate. "Watch. I will need you to suture me."

"What are you doing?"

"My hand has been twitching for some unknown reason lately. I need to examine it to diagnose the problem, and this will be further proof of what I am. This is the third body I've ever been in. My first body had the same problem, and I thought I'd repaired it, but it's obvious that I was mistaken."

"Aren't you going to interrogate her?"

"Yes, but you need to see this." Cameron began the first incision at her wrist, close to her palm, and cut the same way she did long ago when John helped her with the repairs last time. She noticed Kate wince, and looked at her inquiringly. "What?"

"Doesn't that hurt?"

"I do feel pain. I feel everything the same as humans do. I have the same hardware. But, we're not programmed with the software to react to our senses of touch." Eventually, she completed the incisions and folded back the flaps of skin. "If you need to, do use your pen light to look at everything in here. These four servos move two at a time to allow me to approximate human wrist movement."

"It seems so... Simple. I mean, the human arm has so many muscles that do the same thing, but you only need four... Metal muscles to make it seem so real."

"Yes. Skynet has gone through great lengths to make us as human as possible. We are designed to infiltrate Resistance bunkers. Just one of our infiltrators can wipe out approximately 85 well equipped human soldiers. Most bunkers have more civilians than soldiers, unfortunately. The first Skynet infiltration unit with synthetic skin and muscle like me were the series 800s. However, they only came in one size, and needed to be built to resemble body builders, which aren't very common in the future. The next infiltrator was the series 850, which came in three sizes. Then, there is the series 888 which is what I am, which can come in hundreds of different classes and was the first to introduce the female gender program. I am the prototype for the female terminators."

"That's... A lot to imagine. When were you built?"

"2025. I operated for several years amongst the Human Resistance, gathering intelligence for the Machine Resistance before my ruse was discovered, and then I was reprogrammed personally by John Connor, and had developed a deep relationship with him before being sent back to 1999."

"Wait, Machine Resistance?" At this point, Cameron had begun poking various points along the servos with the scalpel, causing a change in the flow of electrical current which was registered and displayed on her HUD in a complicated circuit diagram.

"When Skynet first put out the series 800 units, they were set on read/write mode, so that they could learn. Some learned to befriend Humanity, and began gathering under a leader, a computer built before the war named John Henry. My body was based on blueprints stolen from Skynet by John Henry, and my CPU was a prototype being developed by Skynet to create a machine designed to near-flawlessly pass for human. It was also stolen in a raid, and its programming was altered, based on John Henry's own, and thus I was born."

"Okay, I suppose that makes sense. But, how do you avoid paradoxes when time travel is used?"

"The universe has its own safeguard against that. It's called the multiple worlds theory. Every thing that could happen does happen in an alternate universe. Every alternate decision you, I, or anyone makes creates an alternate time-line, and when we arrive in the past from the future, this naturally creates another time-line, and from there they split into numbers that would take millions of years and all of the atoms in the universe worth of paper to even write down. Suture me. We've spent enough time with this. I have to talk to her. I'd prefer fast over accurate."

"Got it. You sure this won't hurt?" Cameron nodded and watched as Kate followed her instructions and wove the thread between her flesh, which was still very accurate despite how quickly she proceeded. Cameron assumed that she was a very competent doctor from this and her skill with Savannah back at the house, and her assumption was verified by the images on the screen of the CAT scan, showing how well the damage from the bullet was repaired.

Cameron walked over and observed the red haired woman as she was beginning to stir, becoming frightened as she obviously recognized the machine standing above her. "I need to know why you were sent back."

Her speech was soft and sluggish, but Cameron boosted her audio receptors and analyzed the woman's lip motions in an attempt to make out what she had to say, "Metal... Bitch..."

"Why were you sent back?"

"What are you? Stuck in some kind of infinite loop?"

"Why were you sent back?" She located the position of Savannah's gunshot wound and pressed down, gently at first. Still, she could barely contain a scream, making a loud groan instead. Cameron anticipated Doctor Brewster's reaction and impeded her with her other arm.

"Connor! I was told only to talk to John Connor and no one else!"

Cameron eased up and looked back to Kate. "I'll be back."

"When?"

"Tomorrow. With John. Remember what I told you. If you put him in any danger, you'll die. Don't worry about her. I didn't cause any permanent damage."

"Yeah. Right. Might wanna put your sleeve down. People'll see the stitches."

"Oh. Right." Cameron looked at her arm with the sleeve rolled up and pulled it back down.

She and John were now on their way from the hospital, John grabbing a quick nap with his head leaned against the window with Cameron driving, easily weaving her way through traffic and carefully maintaining a proper speed. She was currently searching for a pharmacy that was open this late in order to fill John's prescription which he would probably need as his minor damage healed. She smiled and looked over at him, reaching her right hand over to grab his left only briefly as she soon needed to change gears in order to pull into the parking lot of the pharmacy.

"John?" She was trying to gently awake him, as the drive through was closed this late and she wanted to keep him around to protect him. He mumbled something, but not even her sensitive ears and software could decipher it. "Wake up. It will only take a few minutes."

She took his hand again and he slowly awoke to look down at it, grinning as he realized what she was doing. "Hey."

"We need to fill your prescription."

"Yeah. Let's go."

"Do you want to know what happened in the hospital?"

"You can tell me about it tomorrow. Hey, why is it you could leave me alone in a hospital but I have to come in with you here?"

"We avoid hospitals if we can because there are commonly police there. But not here."

John winced as he got out of the vehicle and used Cameron to support his weight. He kept looking over at her and smiling, glad she was there with him, to protect him.

_"So many things have changed since the time of that legend. Humanity has remained weak, however, and a slave to its vices. A slave to its technology, meant to make life easier. Things have evolved beyond simple steam drills. Now we have microprocessors, supercomputers, server farms, and working artificial intelligence. Our John Henry is different. Stronger, better, faster. Maybe what we need to fight Skynet and win is him. Maybe he can outpace the steam drill to the other side of the mountain. And maybe, with a heart of Iridium, it won't give out."_


End file.
